A Small Slight Figure
by Brown-eyed snowy owl
Summary: A hollowed out hill, and a girl who wakes up not knowing anything of the world or of herself. There's a necklace, eagles, a snake sitting in a tree.. It's nearly finished. Please R&R! I've loved writing it, but would love to learn from it!
1. Chapter 1

**A Small Slight Figure**

A small, slight figure lay on the ground, twining the long grass around her pale fingers, gazing into the deep purple sky. A cold wind blew over her, making the long summer grass which surrounded her body ripple sideways, almost covering her completely. Hidden, as she had always been, thought she herself didn't know it. How can one know one is hidden when one doesn't know there is anything to hide from?

There were several reasons that the girl was lying in the grass. Foremost was because she loved watching the stars and losing herself in their infinite expanse, and so it was that on many nights she wandered outside and rested, gradually drifting into dreams. Second was that in late August it was just warm enough to sleep outside, and the soft grass of this hill, which she had found a month or so ago, was much more comfortable than the straw-covered slab of rock in the place she lived- a hollowed out hill. And the third reason, a reason unique to this night, was that the girl had decided she needed a name.


	2. Chapter 2

First Steps

The first thing the girl could remember was the feel of cold stone against her skin. Then came awareness that she _had_ skin-she had something to feel with. Suddenly she became conscious of her whole body, and could hear the breath coming out of her nostrils when she exhaled, could taste the ancient air at the back of her mouth, and could see the black of her eyelids. So, realising that she was able to, she opened her eyes and saw.

She had awoken lying on a slab of stone at the side of a large room that she soon discovered was the hollowed-out inside of a hill. The floor was all earth and around the edges were rows and rows of dark slate shelves, piled wih hundreds of objects. Dried meat hung from the rough stone ceiling and from there too came the drip, drip of water as it fell to the floor and streamed away in a tiny rivulet. In the centre of the room was a table of shining black metal with a high-backed angular throne at its head. On the opposite side there was a small low chair, woven of reeds, but ones thick and strong enough to support a child's weight.

It was this chair the girl first attempted to reach, perhaps an hour after first becoming aware of her own existence, shakily raising herself into a sitting position, and, inch by inch, moving her legs around so she could slide off the waist-high granite slab she had been lying on. Her feet touched the ground and she pushed off with her arms. For a moment she stood, then her knees buckled and she crashed to the floor. Unconsciousness swamped her, drawing her back into its dark depths.


	3. Chapter 3

Into the World

When she awoke again, she resumed her quest to get to the chair and, crawling, it didn't rake her long to reach it. Using it to lean against she stood up, pushing it forward and stepping after it. In this way the girl taught herself to walk.

Eventually, after an indefinable but countless long time, after many collapses and determined, unperturbed recoveries, the girl's perseverance paid off and she was able to stagger a few steps independently, without the support of the chair. She was able to walk without difficulty instantly and capered around the room, astonished. It was almost as if she had been revising something she hadn't done for a very long time, but now she could do it naturally. It was when she finally achieved her aim, of walking, that she understood why she had been trying to walk. So that she could escape from the overbearing, sinister feeling that emanated from the tall throne and filled the cave.

It was strange how she somehow knew that that room was not her entire world, though perhaps it was simply because of the tiny, trickling rivulet and the fact it must be going somewhere. Stepping carefully and quietly with her bare feet, she made her way through an archway held up with black timber, and along a narrow low passageway, following the water. The passageway twisted sharply and the girl emerged onto a hillside into the night where a shower of soft rain seemed to be healing the land. As it drenched her, soaking the cotton of her thin white dress, it seemed to heal her also, cleansing her, though what it was mending she did not know.


	4. Chapter 4

A Name

Eating from the food which was stacked on the shelves in the hill, drinking from the stream that the little rivulet she came to think of as hers ran into, sleeping when it was warm enough outside and when not, sleeping on the granite slab (though she covered it with a thick layer of dried grass first), the girl lived. She didn't count the passing days, though when she looked back on that period she had a sense of the times of sun flying swiftly by, hundreds of them, spent simply sitting in different places watching the world, completely absorbed by its beautiful, intricate complexity.

Sometimes she would climb as far as she dared into the mountains, trekking East across the foothills, of which her hill was one, and scrambling up their steep slopes. From their heights she loved to look out over the landscape below, wondering if she would ever visit some of the places in the distance that were too far for her to walk to. The limit on how far she could wander from her hill was the amount of food that she could fit in the bag that had also been on the shelves, but within this 3-day boundary she explored many places.

One of her favourites, about a day away from her room was the small hill which she was lying on now. Immediately to the north it had a little wood and running on one side, another stream, quite a wide one. But the best reason the girl liked this particular hill was the view of the stars it gave her, and of the sharp peaks of the towering mountains, regions of utter blackness silhouetted against the sky. This meant it was one of the places she could think best, so it was here she came to choose her name.

The girl didn't speak, having no-one to converse with, and therefore having no need to, but in order to remember the places she visited she named them according to sounds that could be heard there. So the hill on which she was now lying, with the grass almost covering her, was sss-idl-idl, for the sound of the wind going through the grass and the gurgling of the stream. Her name, she thought, should be of the sounds most important to her. The short "i-i" of the drip, drip of water as it fell from the rock ceiling of her hill was the first sound she heard, so that should come first. Next she decided upon the sighing "leeeh" of the wind, then the "sssst" as it makes trees leaves rustle, and last the cry of the large mountain bird that she heard sometimes, its piercing "ay" resonating through the cliffs, like wildness and freedom made into a sound. So that was the girl's name. I-leeh-ssst-ay. Ilesté. Having decided, completed her task, Ilesté swiftly descended into sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

Others

A strange sound awoke her, a short happy sound that she had not heard before: the sound of human laughter. It was followed by the sound of soft voices, two, on quite deep and the other higher but both unmistakeably happy. They were coming swiftly closer to the place where Ilesté lay motionless, hidden in the grass. Though she could not remember hearing anyone talk, including herself, the sound seemed somehow familiar and so she was not afraid. She waited for what seemed a very long minute as the two people climbed to the top of the hill, about half a metre from where she was. She could just see them, their two hands linked, gazing back over the way they had climbed. Although she couldn't see them very well she was able to make out their shapes, and suddenly she drew in a quick astonished breath. They were creatures like her!

They spun around together at the noise, and one of them strode towards the place where she was, the other quickly following. As they saw her their two sets of eyes widened in unison, and one of them, the one shaped more like Ilesté herself, knelt beside her. Ilesté sat up and met the woman's stare Ilesté smiled tentatively and the woman smiled back.

"Who are you?" Éowyn whispered.

Ilesté tilted her head to one side to show she didn't understand. The problem of having to learn somebody else's language as well as learning to make the sounds with her voice hadn't occurred to her. She did, however, know one word already, having just decided upon it: her name. So, with a slight stirring of pride within her, she pointed to herself and manipulated her tongue and lips to make the word "Ilesté". So, unwittingly, she answered Éowyn's question.

Éowyn and Faramir introduced themselves in the same way and then began a short discussion, none of which Ilesté could understand, but she correctly guessed that it was about her.

"There are no villages here, in what was of old the Witch-Realm of Angmar. Where can she have come from?" Faramir asked Éowyn, his voice troubled.

"I cannot guess any better than you, my lord. Yet I feel this meeting is of importance, though I cannot say how, and though it does not seem reason for an eight-year-old girl to hold sway over the fates of many, born and yet to be born, I feel it is so."

"Since I stood with you in the wondrous gardens of Ithilien and we exchanged vows I have come to trust these intuitive feelings of yours almost as if they were some Farsight, so many times have they proved true. But Éowyn my love, White Lady of Rohan, I fear that this child is not indeed a child, but some shape-changing wight of this haunted realm."

"Nay, Faramir," Éowyn replied, and Ilestédetected the small note of pleading that wove into her voice, "if my feelings have been correct it is because they are the Knowledge of the spirit that comes from being a healer in the aftermath of terrible war. And this child to me seems lost and unbearable lonely, though perhaps she herself isn't aware of it. No wight would bear these signs."

"Well then, she must come with us, and you must heal her, and it may be she will indeed affect the lives of many, for perhaps in the troubled times of Middle Earth that we have just passed, what is reason and what is not altered subtly so that now many things are not so unlikely."

So it was that Faramir offered his hands to Éowyn and Ilesté and helped pull them up from the grass, and Ilesté with the pack of food that she had brought from her hill, walked with them to the place where their horses were grazing and their camp was set up, and slept for the remainder of the night beside them.


	6. Chapter 6

Body Language

Ilesté rode in front of Éowyn for two days without speaking, just listening to the familiar voices of the animal and trees, and marvelling at the new wonders that she saw as she passed beyond the places which she had visited.

Faramir and Éowyn, however, worried that she hadn't spoken at all.

"Is she unhappy that we have taken her away? Perhaps she _does _have some family back there, or-"

"Ssshh, Éowyn. Don't be upset. I think it is more that she doesn't understand or speak the Westron tongue. This confuses me, as she replied when you asked her who she was…" Faramir trailed off into silence, a frown etched on his face, but in contrast Éowyn felt a faint smile play around her lips.

"Well," she said, "only Ilesté can tell us the answers. So I had better teach her the Westron!"

Ilesté let herself be led by Éowyn to a small, still pond, and knelt beside her, looking at the picture she saw there. One part of it looked just like Éowyn so the part next to it… that part had to be her! She saw the reflection of her eyes widen, and Éowyn laughed delightedly at her surprise. She pointed to the reflection of Ilesté's eyes, and then to her own eyes.

"Eyes."

"Eyes," Ilesté echoed, catching on. She had hoped that the people like her who had found her would teach her to communicate with them. Then she would be like one of the birds, twittering and tweeting and sharing thoughts with the others. She looked back at her reflection. Her eyes were dark brown, like the bark of a tree, and flecked with lighter brown. Éowyn moved onto hair.

"Hair," Ilesté repeated. Hers was mouse brown, long, falling to halfway down her back, since it had never been cut, and was slightly wavy.

"Nose. Ears. Mouth. Lips. Face. Neck. Shoulder…" and so on.

Suddenly Éowyn stopped, shocked, at a sound she had vaguely registered. It was Faramir, and he was shouting that there was danger in the camp where they had left him with the horses. She had to go back and help fight whatever it was!

"Ilesté, stay here!" she whispered, hoping the girl would get the gist. Then she ran, as quietly as she could, to Faramir's aid,

Ilesté had heard the urgency in Éowyn's voice, and so guessed the meaning of her words. She waited for an age-long minute beside the pond, and then crept along to a bush much nearer the camp and hid there. Her muscles were beginning to ache from being so tense when she heard a scream. Éowyn!

She sprinted towards the camp, and pausing to peek out from behind a conveniently placed tree, saw that a huge snake had wrapped itself around Éowyn, ready to crush her, while Faramir stood, sword outstretched, unable to do anything for fear the snake would instantly kill his wife.

Ilesté had seen a snake of this kind before, wrapped around a fallen tree when she was on an exploration. She had jumped right over it and all it had done was waggle its head at her. Why was this one being so aggressive and evil?

She walked out into the open space where they had made camp, heading straight for the snake.

"No, Ilesté," Éowyn coughed, "Faramir, please don't let her get hurt." Yet Faramir did nothing, for he saw in the set of Ilesté's small jaw and in her purposeful strides that she wouldn't be stopped. The two adults watched transfixed as she walked around until she was facing the snake's face.

Ilesté met its sinister gaze. Its pupils were narrow and black, surrounded by glowing red. She coolly glared at it, pouring all her dislike and cold anger into that glare, then narrowed her eyes threateningly. The snake loosened the coils squeezing Éowyn. Ilesté nodded her head contemptuously in the direction from which it must have come, and the snake gradually, ever so slowly, unwound itself and slithered back into the gloomy trees. Ilesté glared at it until she could no longer see it at all, paused for a moment, then turned to find Faramir on the ground next to Éowyn, holding her hand, and them both staring at _her_, but in astonishment rather than anger.


	7. Chapter 7

**Left Behind?**

They stood a little way away from the camp, where Ilesté was sleeping and frowning at her dreams.

"What else but a wight could have made that snake leave? What child would have the courage to go up to it like she did?" Faramir could not help raising his voice slightly as he tried to convince Éowyn of his suspicions, convincing himself at the same time. The White Lady of Rohan was, true to her nature and the nature of her ancestors, being stubborn. This was one of the things Faramir loved about his wife, which make it even harder to argue with her.

"I am very sorry, Éowyn, truly sorry, for I too begin to grow fond of Ilesté, but I am forced to conclude that she is a wight- an evil shape shifter."

"And I begin to see your point Faramir," Éowyn admitted, looking at the ground, and feeling angry tears well up. "But my heart refuses to believe it. And if she _is_ evil why has she not murdered us in our slip, or just lit the snake kill me? I do not know what to think, and therefore not what to do either!"

Faramir took Éowyn in his arms and held her close, until her tears subsided, then kissed her tenderly. The moon made her hair shine, a waterfall of molten silver coursing down her back. She really was beautiful, and all the more so because he had nearly lost her today.

"We will give Ilesté the judgement of our hearts. If, as I fear, it is folly, then at least we shall not be ever wondering if it _was_ an innocent child we would have abandoned to the foothills of the Angmar Mountains. But if, on our journey to visit the hobbits, she does anything more to indicate that she is a wight, then we shall have to ride on without her." Éowyn nodded, accepting Faramir's judgement.

No more incidents occurred in the following fortnight, but much progress was made, both in terms of distance and of getting to know each other. Ilesté was quite pleased with how much she was able to communicate with Faramir and Éowyn, even if it was through a mixture of words and mime. Éowyn tended to be much better at guessing these mimes than Faramir, and several times when Ilesté didn't know the word for something she wanted to say to Faramir, so she was miming, Éowyn refused to explain to her husband what Ilesté was trying to say, instead collapsing in fits of laughter art Faramir's attempts at guessing. (Sometimes Ilesté _did_ actually know the words, but simply wanted to make them all laugh. She was swiftly realising how lonely she had been when she was on her own.)

Ilesté did not know where they were going, but sensed the growing excitement as they neared their destination. They were about a day's ride away when they encountered trouble- a wall of dense trees, stretching away in one direction, and halting at a cliff edge in the other. They couldn't tell whether it was a narrow band of trees or a huge forest, and they couldn't see any way for the horses to get through the undergrowth.

Only Ilesté was small enough to crawl through the brambles, so she offered to go and look. Faramir looked at her surprised; he had not thought of that, and nodded his encouragement. So Ilesté slipped off her horse and wriggled into the trees.

It was very dark under the canopy, but Ilesté, who liked the steady peacefulness of wooded places, didn't find the darkness oppressive. And it was by no means silent- there were birds all around, singing and hopping importantly from branch to branch to converse with each other. There was a bird-voice she recognised! A bird like that had lived near her hill and she had listened to it, watching it going about its daily routine for hours on end. Ilesté tried to follow the voice which darted from tree to tree playfully. She ran after it eagerly, completely forgetting why she was in the forest (which wasn't actually a forest but a small wood, with the other side not far), revelling in the joy of recognising something. Suddenly the ground was moving and cracking beneath her feet, and the trees around her were shaking. Her arms flailed and she grabbed onto something she couldn't get her balance she was falling. She knew no more.

She didn't hear Faramir and Éowyn calling, and searching, and weeping. She didn't hear them continue on their journey, believing her dead, captured and eaten by some malicious creature of the "forest". She didn't hear the sounds of the wood die away as she was borne far from it.


	8. Chapter 8

**Borne towards Death**

It was a miracle that Ilesté didn't drown and be swallowed up forever by the river. Yet instead the water seemed to take care of her, guiding her without a jolt past tiny peninsulas and around meanders. It could not however, prevent her from becoming dangerously cold and wet. Eventually, she began to come round.

Coldness. A long, grating sound- herself groaning. Grey shapes. Light grey water, all around her. Wet. More colours coming-brown. Right in front of her. Her head on something hard and her arm stiff and painful, gripping something next to her head. Her thoughts lost their fuzziness and she awoke fully. She was clutching the branch that she had grabbed trying to get her balance as the cliff gave way and she fell into the river. It was this branch that had kept her alive, her head above the water, resting on it. Ilesté pulled herself further onto it so she was lying along it and could look well at her surroundings. She was travelling rapidly and the banks were terrifyingly unreachable.

Ilesté could not, of course, swim, and the river was deep.

She was shaking with cold and her finger had gone a ghostly white, tinged with green. She wouldn't be able to hold on much longer; she had to get to the bank, quickly. But there was nothing she could do now, except wait.

It was dark now- the moon and stars all obscured by the cloud which was felt rather than seen, an oppressive mass above. Ilesté would have liked her life to end on a night that was special in some small way, so that she might be remembered, but, faced with death, she couldn't feel anything, just a continuous ache somewhere inside her. She was barely paying attention to the dark blurs of bank she was being swept past- the hope of getting to land had faded several hours ago, and was now non-existent. She could barely move her head, and couldn't even feel from her waist downwards, the part that had been immersed in the water while she was unconscious.

She did, however, sense the speed at which she was travelling gradually decrease, and see the bank get further away until suddenly it vanished and in its place was a seemingly endless expanse of water. As Ilesté drifted on the dark water of the lake, away from the estuary she had come from, the pulsing currents seemed to torture her by pushing her parallel to the edge, not all that far away.

Suddenly out of the corner of her eye she saw a streak of white. She tried to move to see it clearly- a bird! Then the log was rolling and she was seeing only black water, and was sinking to the mud that reached up to welcome her only a second after she had fallen in. It wasn't deep- if she could just use her legs to stand up. She struggled and writhed underwater. Her legs wouldn't obey her and her breath was already running out. Her arms were working though, as if by reaching out she could float back to the surface. Her screaming brain made her hands pull herself along the lake-bed, blood flowing freely as sharp rocks cut her but she didn't notice. It was nothing compared to the agony of not being able to breathe. The last of her breath erupted in a storm of bubbles. She could only breathe in water now but she wouldn't, she wouldn't, she wouldn't. She couldn't haul herself any further without oxygen and she relaxed into the mud, a soft bed which she could sleep in forever. Ilesté was about to breathe in the water when the flash of the bird flying just above the surface of the water made her look up. She wanted to call for its help, or to say goodbye, or just to see it one last time, or to ask if it would show the way to whatever lay beyond death so she threw her hands out towards it, and her chest followed, and her head broke free of the water as she sat up. She breathed and the giant white bird took her shoulders in its talons and flew her away.


	9. Chapter 9

_Thank you very much to all my reviewers, particularly Elflingimp and Cookie Monster's Crystal Ball! It's so nice to know that someone is reading this!_

**Pain**

Ilesté awoke as the cold dawn light pierced her eyelids, slicing through her sleepy stupor. Mornings weren't usually her favourite time of day but this morning she felt peculiar; ill and exhausted but at the same time exalted. When she tried to work out what was making her feel so strange, she could only remember the bird, shining through the dark water, a blur of white, and something holding her shoulders. She reached a hand up to rub one and immediately regretted it. She couldn't move anything without tremendous currents of pain running through her whole body- it made her gasp in agony, and she reflexively relaxed again. One of the pains, however, persisted, and she swiftly realised that this pain was hunger.

The memories came crawling back. The last time she had eaten was with Éowyn and Faramir, almost a day ago. Ilesté know she would soon be thirsty as well, but at the moment she had no wish to go anywhere near any water- not that she could. If the pains didn't go away how was she going to get food! At least she could now feel her legs- she supposed they had thawed while she was asleep. She silently thanked the stars that she had been spared consciously experiencing _that _pain. Perhaps the sun's warmth would complete the task- she hoped. And given that there was nothing she could do except hope, she just lay there, listening.

She could hear the gentle slap of water very close on her left hand side- the lake she assumed. Birds flew over her occasionally, and at one point a magnificent animal which she didn't recognise came and gazed down at her, as if assessing her, they trotted away, its antlers held proudly high. Ilesté posed no threat to it; she posed no threat to anyone but she herself was very vulnerable. Eventually she sank back into sleep.

The shadows were lengthening once more when Ilesté opened her eyes. The hunger was dulling her senses and she realised that she had to ear, and drink, or she would soon sink into a dazed state from which she wouldn't be able to escape. But _how_ was she to find food? Even if she could walk to the river and drink she had no idea…? An experimental twitch of her finger still sent pain through her, but it was bearable. She lifted her head, clenching her jaw to stop herself crying out or collapsing again.

Slowly, limb by limb, Ilesté sat up, sobbing from the agony it caused her, the convulsive sobs making every part of her assault her frenzied mind with screaming signals, but she couldn't stop. Time disappeared amongst all this and the only measurement was the distance she managed to drag herself backwards, until she was leaning against the trunk of a tree.

Ilesté was able to rest a little, letting her ragged breathing even out slightly again. It was amazing she hadn't passed out. Desperately hoping that there would be some food somewhere she managed to stand, the tree supporting her back, but after lying down for so long the blood rushed from her head and her vision was completely obscured by green lights. After a moment they faded away and Ilesté was able to edge around the tree so she was facing into the copse. There was nothing edible there, and even worse, she saw that the water she had thought it would be possible to reach was close, but was two metres below the edge of the bank, which dropped down like a tiny cliff. For Ilesté this was as much as an obstacle as the biggest of cliffs.

Food- she needed food. Food, any food. She staggered from tree to tree searching for berries- anything she could eat. It was soon dark, and she felt faint and unbearably weak. As she tried to catch hold of the branch of the next tree she missed, and fell, landing in the damp leaf litter. Her hand was throbbing painfully, even more so than the rest of her body- she had clutched at some brambles as she fell. Turning her head to look at her hand, she noticed some mushrooms growing near her face. There were three of four, in a clump, almost as tall as her hand, with large caps. Could she eat them? For some reason she was wary, but then again they could be food just as easily as poison. She put one in the pocket of her dress as a last resort if she could find nothing else, and then perhaps she would be grateful even if it was poison, for a swift death by poisonous juices would surely be better than being slowly drained of all strength.

She crawled on, her mind by now adjusted to the pain, searching, digging in the leaf litter for a fallen nut, or a seed dropped by a careless bird. Soon she came to the end of the trees, and crawled back out onto the grass, and kept crawling, crawling, part of her still hoping to find something. She could no longer hear the gentle lap of the lake, and the trees were small if she turned back. At some point it started raining, the water hammering down from the sky, distant thunder growling in the mountains, threatening to come closer. Ilesté shook with cold and with tiredness as she crawled through the dark. Finally she crumpled, and lay there, face turned towards the clouds, the rain beating upon her, pouring over her. Her shaking subsided and she lay, still.


	10. Chapter 10

**A Beautiful Lady**

A beautiful lady walked silently by the edge of Lake Nenuial, rain pouring from her dark cloak, which blended perfectly with the night. Her solemn eyes gazed on the ground, on the grass beneath her feet, but she didn't really see it. She was lost in thoughts, some sad, some happy. As much as she had gained, she had lost, but in her solitary wandering she could feel the ones whom she loved, and who had departed, as if they were near. Her heart led her away from the lake and its water- she didn't wish to see herself reflected alone and sorrowful. She was not meant to be sad yet.

A light shape against the dark ground caught her notice and she slowly walked towards it. As she saw what it was she ran to kneel beside it, tears blurring her vision, and her thoughts, still present in her mind, subtly altered Ilesté's face so it seemed to the lady that she was crying over her mother's body.

The warm tears fell on Ilesté's face and she opened her eyes with her last energy. There was a dark angel above her. She had the vague idea that she recognised the face for a moment, and then her eyes closed again, and she was borne further down the river to death. The lady watched her eyes open and saw that they were not the eyes of her mother, but the eyes of a dying child. She bent down, agonized that she hadn't realised earlier, for this child had a slim chance of life now. She cradled the small, light body in her arms, trying to give her some warmth and murmured words of healing over her. The words had little power coming from her now, and yet they seemed to have some effect nevertheless. Whispering to her all the while, she carried Ilesté through the night.


	11. Chapter 11

**Sunlight**

Ilesté walked along the golden-sanded shores of life, the warm, silken air blowing around her, the motherly sun laughing as her shy smile became one of radiant happiness. She was filled with the desire to run, and run, and as she did, she found her feet couldn't step fast enough so she flew, an exalted being, then she let herself drop, rolling over and over in the sand, until she lay, breathless, looking into the sky. Slowly it changed, faded, solidified, to become a white ceiling.

The room was painted all white, so it shone with a soft brilliance as the afternoon light poured in. Ilesté was lying in a large brass bed, on a simple, luxurious cotton sheet, with the duvet gathered around her. There was little furniture in the room, just a small pine wardrobe on the opposite wall, a chair and writing desk with pen, ink, and paper, beneath the window, and directly to her left, at the opposite end to the door, was a small wooden dressing table with white-washed legs, upon which stood a mirror and a glass of water. Slowly, savouring the feel of cotton slipping beneath her, she got up and walked to the glass of water. There was no pain.

As she was putting the empty glass down, she noticed in the mirror that she was wearing a different dress- a pale yellow nightie. The person who had lifted her up must have brought her here, and dressed her in it.

Suddenly she heard a noise outside, followed by the thumping of little running feet, and the creaking of floorboards as bigger ones pursued, trying to be quiet. There was a hiss:

"Ssshh! Gideon, come back! You'll disturb the guests! You are _so_ naughty!" The _so_ was hissed with particular vehemence, but you could tell the child, for it was a child's voice, was more excited than cross.

Ilesté watched the door, slightly nervous but not afraid as a small chubby hand appeared around it, followed by a three-year-old boy. He was grinning mischievously. Catching sight of Ilesté, his face turned solemn, he put a finger to his lips, and entreated her with round blue eyes not to give him away. Then he scuttled across the room and hid under the writing desk.

A moment later the other footsteps came to a halt outside the door, and, after knocking twice, a girl a year or so younger than Ilesté entered, apologizing as she did so:

"I'm very sorry for disturbing you; I think my little brother just-" seeing Ilesté she broke off.

"Hello," she said staring. The way the girl met Ilesté's eyes without hesitation, the way she held herself, the way her bright green irises sparkled with the residue of the childish mischief which her younger brother possessed in such quantities; all were signs of this girl's confidence. Yet, unlike so many with that kind of certainty in them, her confidence went hand in hand with awareness of others. With all the politeness and charm of the best of the nobility, she shook herself from her stare, and skipped to the end of the bed.

"Sorry about bursting in like this!"

"Oh, it is fine!" replied Ilesté, piecing together her scraps of the Westron, "It is nice to meet someone new- well, two new people!" The girl smiled gratefully at Ilesté, relieved to know she wasn't going to get into trouble.

"Do you come from near here? Your accent isn't one I recognise... in fact, it doesn't really sound like an accent… oh bother- I'm rambling again." She rolled her eyes at herself.

"I am just learning this tongue," explained Ilesté. "My name is Ilesté. I woke up here a small part of time ago."

"Ilesté- that sounds lovely. Not like my name: Aurelen. _Why_ Mummy and Daddy called me Aurelen I don't know. Well, I do actually- it comes from dawn or early morning or something along those lines. Apparently they first told me that when I was small, and I threw a tantrum, because I didn't like the morning; I wanted to stay up late, so I liked the evening better. And I demanded to be called Evie. So could you _please_ call me that."

"I will. Though Aurelen _is_ a nice name." This was the first time Ilesté had met someone of approximately her own age, and she had taken an instant liking to Evie.

"I suppose the name's alright. That story does make me sound like a selfish brat doesn't it?"

"Selfish brat?" Ilesté queried.

"It means like, idiotic child," Evie clarified.

"No, I don't think you were an idiotic child. You should be allowed to choose your own name. Your name is what describes you, and you know you better than anyone else does! I made mine up." Evie looked at Ilesté with a kind of respectful awe.

At that moment there was a little cough from beneath the writing desk. Evie spun around and hauled Gideon out.

"You have to go back to the nursery, Gideon," rebuked Evie, mock-sternly.

"Noooooo," wailed the toddler pitifully, then ruined the affect slightly by sitting down on the floor with a bump, rocking with laughter. Evie sat, gathering him onto her lap, and Ilesté came and knelt beside her.

"Come, let's all go to the nursery!"

The leaf-skeletons shone silver in the wood; their fragile shapes captured wisps of memory and snatches of forgotten music snagged on their beautiful, delicate veins. The elf trod on them contemptuously, smearing the broken fragments into the damp earth. He wiped his shoe, then walked on.

A smile twisted his face as he walked through Lothlorien, surveying the deserted glades, the stoneless, leafy caverns echoing with silence. The bridges between trees that once glowed with the light of the elven and swayed as light feet ran along them, now swung, creaking ominously, dark shapes above. Rotting leaves layered the floor, covering paths, choking streams. He came to _her_ stream, the water of which had been so pure that she enchanted it, and poured it into the stone font, and was able to see, and show Frodo, time. The elf walked up and peered into the stagnant rainwater that had collected there. He saw himself reflected- long, straight black hair, distinguishable from his robe only because it shone slightly, with an evil luminescence. He looked up, to gap in the canopy, to the stars, and sneered,

"Your tree-city decays, Galadriel."


	12. Chapter 12

"Hello!"

"Aragorn!" Arwen ran along the corridor to him, and smiling widely, he twirled her around. Briefly, they kissed.

"Dragons successfully slain I hope!" she teased.

"Well- the boars of Rohan are growing almost as large as dragons from all the peaceful lands they roam, but their breathing fire has been slightly delayed due to a lack of alcohol in their rivers. It was all being used up in the halls of the Rohirrim, where I have been so merrily feasting!" They laughed, and Arwen exclaimed:

"Never before has diplomacy between Gondor and Rohan been so simple!" Her tone changed, "The children missed you, Aragorn. As did I." He drew her close again and they kissed passionately.

When they eventually stopped, Aragorn held Arwen's gaze, sensing that sorrows lay there. She turned away, her neck bent, hair hiding her face. Her voice was soft, and filled with shame as she responded to his concern.

"They haunt me, as if they call me from the white-sanded shores, and all those who died stand beside them, watching me, trying to help me and give me happiness- but the happiness is lost in the sea." She couldn't stop the tears' flow, and Aragorn felt her pain acutely, just as she had felt his doubts when he had looked at the shards of Narsil that night in Rivendell. He gently led her along the corridor into an empty bedroom. She walked silently to the window, to the light, and didn't look out, but lightly ran her slender fingers across the cold glass. The king caught hold of her hand and raised it to his lips.

"Your grief is nothing to be ashamed of Arwen. You have lost your brothers, your father, all your kin. I can never fell that gap and I will not try to. But they are still here- as long as our children live, and our line continues, they will be present in Middle Earth. Thanks to you, Arwen. And although our children are entirely their own wonderful selves, I see much of Elladan and Elrohir in Aran and Gideon. Come to think of it, Evie is incredibly like your father." Arwen laughed, and much of the weight on her eased.

"Yes; the chin, the will-power!" They stood in silence for a moment longer, and then set off in search of their children.

"Aran, you're in here!" exclaimed Evie when they entered the nursery. "How did the riding lesson go?"

"Badly as ever," the boy groaned. Mimicking his teacher's voice: "I don't understand how you can find riding so difficult when your parents are both naturals. It's obvious that you're just not trying!" His glum mood flew away instantly however, when Gideon rushed from the door yelling.

"Aran, Aran!" and adoringly hugged his legs. Aran hauled his younger brother up onto his knees.

"A 'hello' would have been sufficient Dizzy-'un, but I know you like to do things your way!" The toddler promptly pulled at one of Aran's long brown ringlets, but he ignored it, regarding Ilesté with interest. "Evie," he reminded. She jerked out of a daydream.

"Oh sorry- introductions. Aran, this is Ilesté (she made that name up herself you know, don't you think it's pretty?) and Ilesté this is Aran- well Prince Aran and all the rest of it, but my tongue'll get twisted if I try to say the whole thing. So just call him Aran. He prefers that anyway." Ilesté nodded.

"Well," said Aran in a businesslike way, "since we're all here in the nursery, what shall we play?"

Evie quickly gave each of them a role, or in Gideon's case three (minor) roles and they began to act out the story "Ellen". Aran reluctantly accepted the part of the Prince, there being no alternative actor, Gideon was various things, such as a pumpkin, and Evie would have graciously let Ilesté, as the guest, be Ellen, but then they found out she didn't know the story, so they decided it would be easier if she was the fairy godmother.

Ilesté loved it! Dressing up, hearing the others put on such strange voices, saying the right lines, making somebody else's story come alive! And doing it with other people. Evie uncovered a collection of dresses that had been made a tiny bit too big for her, real party dresses, and after some debate between the two older siblings, Aran convinced Evie that Ilesté would look best in the dark red satin one for being a guest at the ball. They tried to teach her a few dance steps, with _some_ success, but they ended up trying not to fall over from laughing at (the correctly named) Dizzy-'un's attempts at copying them.

The king and queen heard the children's laughter and made towards the nursery in the west of the palace. They could hear Evie's bossy voice, Gideon's gleeful cackle, Aran, explaining something, and another, quieter one, pleading or persuading. Arwen hesitated, a strange sensation washing through her, and the king also halted.

"We have guests?" he queried. She didn't answer for a moment, but then turned to Aragorn.

"Yes; I found her a few nights ago, by the edge of the lake. Gilrath, one of the servants, has helped to heal her. She was near death. We have no idea who she is but I…" Arwen stopped, and Aragorn drew a finger along the line of her jaw, giving her strength.

"I feel…I know her."

"We will discover who she is," Strider promised, "Have faith, Evenstar." She nodded.

"I do."

The children rushed to their father when he ran into the room, having not seen him for a month. Their mother joined the hug. After a few seconds they broke apart, and the children fired questions at their father.

"Did you ride really fast Daddy?"

"Did you kill any orcs?"

"Did you miss us?"

"Did you see the ents?"

"Did you see the Shield-arm Lady?"

Aragorn looked at his daughter quizzically.

"Gilrath was telling us about how she was a woman not a man, but she fought in the big battle outside Minas Tirith anyway."

"Oh! No, Evie, I didn't see the Shield-arm Lady. I saw her brother though, and he said that the Shield-arm Lady is coming to visit us? Is that right Arwen?"

"It is; Éowyn should be here very soon."

Ilesté, who had hung back from the family hug, jumped. Everyone's attention was instantly on her. Her eyes were wide with shock.

"Éowyn and Faramir are coming here? This is where we were travelling to?" Seeing how much of a surprise it had given her, Arwen took Ilesté's hand and sat her down.

"You were travelling with them?"

"Yes," answered Ilesté shakily, suddenly feeling very self-conscious. Her friend Evie saw this, and drew everyone's eyes back to her by asking when supper would be.

"Shall we have it all together tonight, because Daddy is back?" suggested Arwen.

"Ilesté too?" Evie indicated Ilesté.

"If she would like."

"I would love to, thank you," she replied timidly.

"Shall we go and find out from cook what we're having?"

So the six of them went, talking non-stop, through the hallways, down the stairs, to the kitchen.


	13. Chapter 13

Broken Silence

Ilesté crept through the corridors, testing each floorboard carefully before she put all her weight onto it when she was passing any doors (there seemed to be so many of them!), and running when she was not. Aran and Evie had gone over the route with her earlier in the evening. She stopped before she pushed the night-nursery door. This was the hardest bit- she had to wake up Aran and Evie, without disturbing Gideon, who was sleeping in this same room. She opened the door. It creaked as she did so, a long, drawn-out squeal, and she winced. Aran, on the opposite side of the room, was alert instantly, his eyes snapping open, and he immediately realised what was happening. He signalled for Ilesté to wake up Evie, and began, carefully, to get out of bed, trying not to let his duvet rustle as he pushed it back.

Bending down, Ilesté whispered in Evie's ear. She whispered louder, but her friend was resolutely asleep. Aran, being a sibling was entitled to be a little more forceful, so he crept over and pulled her hair, but still nothing happened, and he exchanged an exasperated look with Ilesté before pulling Evie's duvet off her and onto the floor. She instinctively curled up and groaned as she awoke.

"Don't be mean! It's still dark!" Her bleary eyes roamed around the room until they found the clock on her bedside table.

"It's quarter to two- why are you…?" Finally she caught sight of Ilesté, who was full of excitement, and she clapped her hand over her own mouth as it occurred to her that she was jeopardising her own plan. "Sorry," she mouthed silently, but it became obvious the damage was already done; they turned as they heard Gideon's whinging moan. He stood up in his cot and rattled the bars, getting ready to throw a full-blown tantrum if they didn't let him out. Aran muttered a rude word as he ran over and covered _Gideon's_ mouth with his hand, then scooped him up into his arms.

"You have to be _really _quiet Dizzy!" he hissed, "Or the black panther of the darkness will come and eat you up!" Gideon nodded, and hugged his older brother tightly. Aran lifted his hand.

"Whaddif de black panfer comes anyway? Id'll be all disguised in the night, an'den id'll come froo de window, an' eat me!"

"Ssshh, Dizzy! Not if it doesn't hear you! So stay quiet and go back to sleep." He began to lower him back into the cot, but Gideon squirmed and screeched.

"Id'll see me! An' I can't run away!" In desperation, Aran bargained.

"Ok, Dizzy, you can sleep in my bed. Then if it comes, you can hide under the duvet and then run and get Mummy. Will that do?" The little prince nodded solemnly, and Aran plonked him on the adjacent bed, throwing the duvet over him. They all slipped out.

As soon as the three of them were a way down the corridor, Evie succumbed to fits of laughter, which she forced to be silent.

"The black panther of the darkness!" she snorted, "Skilful inventing Aran!" They all started laughing.

"Do you tell him lots of those stories," asked Ilesté, "or do you save them for special occasions?"

After a few moments they recovered themselves, and restarted their stealthy expedition downstairs.

"About how long ago did you hear them arrive, Ilesté? About how many minutes?"

"I'm not very good at estimating time- the first time I saw a clock was today. But not that long."

Aran spoke:

"We mustn't be seen, all right. Evie! I don't seem to be able to communicate that to you!"

"Well, I'm in a state of great excitement. And what do you expect-I'm going to meet Éowyn!"

"Your hero," he replied sardonically, "and you're not going to meet her; you're going to glimpse her."

"Heroine," she corrected. "Now stop being such a spoilsport." Ilesté grabbed her hand, halting her.

"Listen!" Due to their bickering, Evie and Aran had not been able to hear that someone was coming. Aran pulled them through a convenient door and they waited for whoever it was to go past, and then resumed their journey. Unfortunately the argument was also resumed, but it stopped when Aran heard the grown-up's voices.

"They're in the drawing room off the front hall. Evie, you go and peek first- why you need to see them as soon as they arrive I still don't know- remember to stay on a low level. They're less likely to see you then, but don't get your nightie dirty. Then it's your turn Ilesté. I can understand why _you_ want to see them both: you were travelling with them! Anyway." He tapped Evie on the shoulder to indicate that she should get on and go. Ilesté watched from a safe distance, glad she wasn't going first but at the same time terribly nervous for her friend.

Aragorn and Arwen had come down to greet their guests when they entered the palace, and now they were all talking.

"I hope we didn't awake you, your Majesties; we're sorry for arriving so late at night," Éowyn apologized.

"We were still up and we haven't seen you for such a long time, it really doesn't matter," Aragorn assured them.

"How was your journey?" Arwen graciously inquired. Faramir's face became troubled, and Aragorn noticed this.

"We encountered many dangers, many more than we thought we would, even if it isn't a travelled route. Worryingly, it seemed particularly bad in what would have been the last part of our journey, the area nearest this castle." Aragorn nodded grimly.

"I would be interested to hear of the details tomorrow." His wife took over speaking.

"One of the servants is bringing some food. We'll sit with you while you eat, and then show you to your room."

"Oh please don't feel you need to stay up any longer on our account. We'll be fine eating alone- we've been doing it for most of the past two months!" Arwen was waving away Éowyn's objection when Aragorn heard a noise outside the door and Arwen, with the knowledge of one who loves, looked at him. He met her eyes and flicked a glance at the open door. Arwen smiled, and turned to face it.

Éowyn saw this intimate communication take place in the space of two heartbeats, and suddenly felt a resurgence of bitterness that she was not in Arwen's place. She tensed, feelings battling, until Faramir gently, inconspicuously, lovingly, took one of the stiff hands, ran his rough thumb over it, instantly relaxing her, and she too smiled.

The two strategists (by which the men are meant, for though the women would be just as good at thinking through plans, the men had had more practice) were careful to keep talking so that the 'enemy' would not realise they had been detected. Arwen mimed to the guests to pretend to talk to her about something trivial, trying not to laugh, and Éowyn got the idea right away, but catching the laughter form Arwen, could not speak. Faramir had to try to think up a plausible explanation for her jollity, so began to relate a story of a bumbling giant bumblebee that had attacked them, the ridiculousness of which caused all four of them to collapse, just as the children had earlier, into fits of laughter.

Outside, Evie froze, and screamed as Aragorn ran through the doorway, still laughing, and swung her into his arms. Captured, she was brought in this undignified manner into the company of the adults- most particularly into the company of the greatly admired Éowyn. When her father put her down, she stood, eyes fixed on the floor, while the adults looked down at her with (attempts at) stern faces. If she had had the daring to lift her head, she would have seen her parents were _not_ livid with anger, her father had _not_ thought she was a real intruder, and the guests were _not_ terribly shocked or offended by her awful behaviour. However, she did _not_ look up, and so believed that their anger was real throughout her interrogation. As did Aran and Ilesté, waiting around the corner.

"We can't let Evie be blamed on her own!" gulped Ilesté. Aran nodded decisively.

"No- we cannot abandon her to that fate."

So when, after the perfunctory "why are you not asleep?" and "why are you down here?", "Are you on your own or do you have some accomplice/(s)?" was posed, Aran boldly stepped into the room.

"Accomplices," he announced, "though I'm more the leader than an accomplice, so you mustn't blame Aurelen."

"Noble, Aran, but it doesn't exactly excuse the crime," reprimanded his father, "but fortunately we are among good friends, so it won't affect diplomatic affairs." He formally introduced his children to Faramir and Éowyn. But Arwen was staring at her eldest son with irrational fear and apprehension.

"Accomplices-plural…? Tell me Gideon _is_ safe asleep in his cot Aran!" Aran was saved from answering that well, no, Gideon wasn't in his cot- he was in _his _bed, by Ilesté's quiet voice from just outside the door.

"I am the other…" she couldn't remember the word.

"Accomplice," Éowyn finished, barely audible. She was completely white, like a dove trapped in a car's headlights, eyes fastened to the doorframe, around which Ilesté's head appeared. Faramir drew in a sharp breath. Only one person was looking in a different direction. Evie cried out:

"Lady Éowyn!" Faramir caught Éowyn as she staggered, trying not to faint like some distressed drama queen. Evie ran to push a chair forward, and Faramir lowered Éowyn into it.

Everyone crowded around the chair, waiting for her to recover her strength. She spoke:

"Ilesté?" Ilesté wriggled into the circle.

"Yes?"

"How did you end-?"

"Mummy!!!!!" Gideon's terrified scream echoed through the castle and Arwen ran, long hair and dress flying behind in disarray, to find her son. The screaming continued, and Aragorn turned, deadly serious, to his children.

"Gideon is evidently not in his cot. He could be anywhere in the castle. You children go together and search!"

Arwen flew through the corridors to the nursery. He wasn't there but the window- She whirled around and ran again, ignoring her gasps for breath and the raging pain in her chest, following not the screams but her guesses as to where her son would try to get to if he was very frightened. Her and Aragorn's bedroom! She reached it and the door was open but he wasn't in there. He had been there though, but hadn't found them, so he was somewhere near. The sound was much closer now. Arwen swept down the passageway, throwing each door wide- there!

"Gideon!" He turned-

"Mummy!" His sobs were uncontrollable; he was utterly terrified, but they began to weaken as Arwen hugged him tightly, tears of relief running down her own face. She started to discern words in his sobs.

"Black panfer-came-wanted- to eat me- black black panfer." Aragorn came striding up to them. Arwen's voice was strained,

"The window."


	14. Chapter 14

Mischief and Malevolence

Left in Aran's bed, the sleepy Gideon had instantly become wide awake, the situation's capacity for naughtiness spinning in his head. He wriggled our of bed and, after listening for a moment to check that his siblings weren't still near, he scurried across the room and through the door to the Day Nursery, where they had been earlier. He couldn't reach the bubbles because they were up on the shelf that ran around the room. Bother! The paints were up there too: neatly arranged next to some modelling clay. And the scissors and glue! Gideon scowled at the shelf, very cross with it for keeping thwarting his plans. Then an even better idea occurred to him; if only he knew where the stickerbooks were, he could decorate the door with stickers! He made a gleeful noise- a sort of gurgle/chortle (a churgle), anticipating his fun.

As he ran over to hunt the chest-of-drawers for stickerbooks, a huge, dark shape loomed over him and he squealed, running backwards, but he tripped and fell. What if it was that thing that Aran-! But the thing stayed where it was. Slowly, Gideon overcame his fear enough to creep up to it. He poked it. Ow! He had just shoved his finger against the hard wood of the dolls' house. The dolls' house! A large grin spread across the toddler's face. He wasn't allowed to play with that, in case he broke the furniture, but now everybody was out of the way… Trying to find the clasp, he ran his fingers across the face of the house. There! He unhooked it and one side swung open to reveal four large rooms, decorated beautifully, with perfect miniature furnishings. Not bothering to open the other side, Gideon began to move the furniture around to places he liked better. It was much too boring and grown-up the way he had found it- it definitely could _not_ be played with in that sort of state. So he busied himself.

Distracted by a sudden noise, he froze. It was coming from the Night-Nursery next-door: their bedroom. What if this time it really _was_ the Black Panther, come through the window to look for him and eat him?! He was about to scream and run when he remembered that black panthers could run really fast- it'd hear him and catch him!

Still clutching the table he had been in the process of moving, Gideon tip-toed as quickly and quietly as possible to where the family of big cuddly toy bears were sitting, leaning against the wall. Giving the smallest one a hug, he silently squirmed behind them, and lay there, waiting.

Half a minute later, a cloaked, hooded figure walked into the room, peering into the corners, and circuited it, his burning gaze searching, searching, examining, searching.

"Come out, come out, little prince," he mocked morbidly. That cold voice struck such absolute terror into hidden two-year-old Gideon that he couldn't stop a squeak. The figure stiffened, but fortunately most of the noise had been muffled by the bears' thick fur, so the figure couldn't identify the noise's source. He headed for the door and Gideon was about to start escaping when suddenly the thing whirled around. But nothing had moved. He gave the room one last glance around, then went.

Gideon stayed, paralysed with fear in case the thing came back, and then panic loosened his limbs and he ran, screaming, from the room.


	15. Chapter 15

Dark Green

_A/N- I'm very sorry I haven't put a chapter up for AGES. In my defence I can only plead that I've been writing further ahead in my notebook, so I can now faithfully promise to put up a new chapter each week for a few weeks. I hope you'll forgive me! _

_To recap: Ilesté is staying with Aran, Evie and Gideon (the children of Aragorn and Arwen) in their house/mansion on the edge of Lake Evendim, having woken up there after collapsing near the edge of the lake. She had been travelling with Faramir and Éowyn, who found her accidentally. They have now also reached the house, which was their destination. Aragorn is worried that their journey was unexpectedly difficult, and the night before this chapter starts an intruder tried to kidnap "the little prince"._

They sat in a ring, shaded by two huge cedar trees, Gideon happily pulling up grass. Faramir was speaking, and had been for a while, recounting the dangers of their journey. Normally, Evie would have been struggling to stay attentive, but after last night, she wanted to be better informed. Ilesté was on the grass next to her, motionless apart from one hand, which was, as if independent from the rest of her body, running her fingers through the earth. Soon it would be her own turn to speak. The seconds drained away with Faramir's words- circling for a while and then disappearing, irretrievably, down a hole.

Faramir nodded encouragingly at her when he had finished and, fixing her eyes on the garden beyond the trees rather than looking at anyone, she related the story from her point of view, starting from the episode with the snake, right up until she had collapsed after crawling so far. That was all she could remember wasn't it? So what was it nagging her, like an unidentifiable black cloth just touching her thoughts? Black cloth- was that a face- an angel? Like the one in that story, "Ellen"? Everyone was waiting for her to speak, but she couldn't say she saw some kind of magical being; it had probably been an illusion, her mind's last hope of being saved before she sank into unconsciousness. Embarrassed and confused, she looked down at the ground, and as she did so, a movement in the middle distance made her look straight up again.

"There was someone there," she whispered. Aragorn and Faramir had already jumped up, and they set off in the direction that Ilesté indicated, while Arwen, Gideon, Aran, Evie, Éowyn and Ilesté gathered together between the two cedar trees. They waited, peppering everywhere they could see with anxious glances. Ilesté felt a breath on her neck, and turned her head just in time to see Aran being pulled around the trunk of the tree, a dagger at his throat and a hand over his mouth. She swung out a hand to grab Evie, and they clutched each other tightly for a fraction of a second while thoughts raced through Ilesté's head at breakneck speed, too fast for her to catch them, and so she remained unable to do anything, just watching. Fortunately, Evie was a princess- trained since birth in what to do if someone is attempting to kidnap you, and she reflexively screamed.

Like lightning, elegant, entrancing and deadly, Éowyn whirled around, drawing her sword from her skirts as she moved to the other side of the tree, her sword-point instantly at the kidnapper's neck. They froze, locked in that position; the tall, icy woman staring into the blackness of the stranger's hood, fixing his pallid skin and long waxy face in her memory as he fixed her face in his. Aran was held between them, lifting his chin high, both forced by the dagger and by his own defiance. He didn't seem afraid- he wasn't. Just waiting, tense, for whatever was going to happen next. The suspense bound everybody to the gleaming sword and dagger- everybody except Gideon, who had crawled out from the roots of one of the trees, and was now scrambling up it in order to get away from the stranger. This gave Ilesté a wild idea.

Having quietly bent down and scraped up a handful of earth into her pocket, she began to climb the tree which Aran had been pulled around, the deep ridges of the old bark serving as hand- and foot-holds, until she reached the first cleft in the trunk, where the tree split in two. With a knee in the cleft and one arm wrapped around the left branch, she used the other arm to take out the handful of soil. Leaning out as far as she could without falling, Ilesté carefully sprinkled a small amount onto the hood of the stranger. He looked up and she instantly let the entire handful cascade from her fingers, right into his dark green eyes.

Aran seized the opportunity to throw himself backwards onto his captor's body, and then sideways as they both hit the floor. The dagger slashed out at nothing, and was knocked out of his grasp by Éowyn's sword. Aragorn and Faramir appeared, running towards them, having realised they had been tricked, and seeing them coming, the figure rolled across the ground, rose to his feet and fled to the trees. The company watched him go, and when they had waited for several minutes, warily walked back to the house. Only when they were inside the drawing room did Éowyn slowly sheathe her sword.


	16. Chapter 16

The lake glittered in the Evendim, erratic ribbons of golden light, twisting on the waves that whispered across the water, telling of the boat's passing. The hills ascended around them, majestic and mysterious; In the far distance they seemed to plunge into the black water, cutting down into the deep. Fringing the lake, sharp conifers survived, towered invisibly and massed in the vague and imposing forests on the slopes of the hills.

Ilesté couldn't see the river-mouth where she had come into the lake and, _shying_ away from the terrifying memories that were suddenly very real and close, she drew her gaze back to the reflected lights of the grand house, twisting on the water.

She was like one of those lights: suddenly existing, but in a world where everything was always moving, lifted by the waves to sparkle there for a brief moment, but Ilesté was sure that she too would fragment as the transient happiness moved on, and she would have to collect the pieces of herself together. She realised that Arwen was standing beside her, gazing back at the lights just as she was. Silently they both watched the house until the boat turned into the river.

The ringing screams of metal on metal awoke her, and she sat up. Trying to be as quiet as possible, she got out of bed, walked the few steps to the door of her small bedroom on the boat, and peeked out into the corridor. It was deserted. The sound came again, from up on deck. Her nightie was mercifully moving quietly around her. She climbed the steep wooden stairs, trembling. Where were the others? Had the man with green eyes seen through their plan, and come after the boat rather than followed the company of the household, going by land? Maybe Éowyn was fighting him again?! Ilesté peered over the top of the stairs and held her breath as she saw Éowyn, sword in hand. But she was fighting slowly; Was she tired, or injured? Ilesté couldn't see the adversary – she would have to climb out onto deck to see, but then whoever it was would see her too. And it might distract Éowyn, with disastrous results. Glancing around, she could see nothing to defend herself with- not that she would be capable of causing damage with it anyway!

Plucking up some courage (and knowing it would all vanish in a second), she raced up the last few steps, saw the adversary, and……. stood there feeling so, so stupid. "Hello Ilesté!" exclaimed Aran. Éowyn's sword was instantly at his throat and, looking down at it, he went cross eyed. He stuck his tongue out and waggled it to complete the effect. His new teacher groaned and took her sword away. "You mustn't let people distract you Aran! You _can't_ let people distract you!"

"But what if I'm fighting one person and another one comes up behind me with an axe and cleaves my head in two?!"

"They shouldn't; it's dishonourable."

"But what if! And," Aran raised his eyebrows, "Since when did orcs have honour?!"

"Not that I can recall," admitted Éowyn, "Although in battles that particular dishonourable act is generally disregarded anyway. It's a bit archaic, and more relevant to duels and small fights." Aran turned to Ilesté, indicating his sword. "Do you fight well with these?" She shook her head.

"I've never learned to fight with _anything_," she explained quietly. Her companions stared at her, surprised and startled, and Éowyn for some reason appeared furious.

"Did they not teach girls where you lived?"

"No" she shook her head again "There was just no-one to teach me, and no reason to fight." Éowyn's face relaxed.

"Well I'm afraid there are both of those now. You two and Evie can do an hour of sword practice each day; I'll teach you, although more of my attention is obviously going to be given to Ilesté- perhaps I'll ask your father to help teach you, Aran, and you, Evie. Then Faramir can teach you archery, Ilesté."

At that moment the Queen and Princess came up the stairs from below.

"Teaching archery could prove a challenge on the boat," mused Arwen. "We can try to think of a way to make it possible at lunch, which is almost ready. _I _will be very happy to assist with teaching my children. It would be wise for me to revise my own sword-skills!" Éowyn smiled warmly, and replied with a polite "That would be wonderful! Thank you." That seemed false for some reason, but she didn't understand this internal reaction for a moment. Subconsciously, she touched the hilt of her sword as she wondered. Ilesté noticed the movement, and glanced at her, but Éowyn was deep in thought.

As Éowyn followed the others down the stairs she realised what it was, and was glad she hadn't realised while Arwen was still looking at her. Though Arwen probably suspected anyway, which was why she volunteered herself instead. She hadn't thought it a good idea for Éowyn to spend that much time so close to Aragorn, with only the children's company. The irriataion prickled inside her, although a large proportion of it was at herself, for still having these feelings, which she had thought had faded away. Apparently not. She hoped they weren't going to play any more tricks in her subconscious and make her emabarrass herself further than she already had. She liked and respected Arwen, and did _not_ want to make things difficult, or to hurt Faramir. She loved him, and wished to love him always. He deserved it in every possible way. She wasn't sure exactly what she felt concerning Aragorn- a terrifying kaleidoscope of constantly moving emotions.

She shook her head, a not-quite-imperceptible movement, trying to dislodge these thoughts and feelings.


	17. Chapter 17

The Baranduin

The journey down the Baranduin River was glorious, but swift. The sun of early autumn was wonderfully warm – Ilesté thought perhaps a little _too _warm, as she began her sword-skills lessons. It was soon discovered that she was amazingly…..passable at it. She had no great talent, but Éowyn was a patient and skilful teacher and with practice Ilesté started to progress. The thing that really hindered her was her stamina – she would quickly get very hot and out of breath. On one such occasion she started to feel sick, and though she tried to keep going, she felt more and more unsteady. After another minute, she had to admit to herself that she was barely holding her sword straight, and timidly said:

"Éowyn, I'm really, really sorry; I don't feel normal. Please, could we have a little rest?" Éowyn peered at her with concern, screwing her eyes up against the sun. It might be the effect of her face being in shadow, but she _did_ look pale.

"Would you like to stop for today?" she suggested. Ilesté shook her head.

"I am sure I'll be fine in a few minutes. I would _like_ to do some more…"Suddenly she felt a surge of dizziness (she shouldn't have shaken her head) and she walked over to the side, firmly holding the rail. There was more of a breeze here. Éowyn, having put the wooden swords away, came and led her downstairs.

"I'm very sorry," Ilesté repeated quietly.

"It doesn't matter, Ilesté. You're just quite susceptible to the heat. I am too, though not in the same way, so it's good for me to get out of the sun. Look –" she tapped her nose, which was slightly pink. "The sun burns me easily." She smiled, and Ilesté felt considerably better, but still as if she was letting her down.

No-one had been able to conceive a way of teaching Ilesté archer without dozens of arrows flying overboard, so that was postponed. Instead, she had great fun with Evie being taught to play games, told stories, and being given vivid (and lengthy!) descriptions of Minas Tirith. She learnt many words this way, tilting her head to one side whenever she didn't understand something, which was rather frequently. Every so often they had to run up to find Aran (who was usually on the deck) in order that he could verify what Evie was saying.

The time she was told the number of people who lived in the city, she just stared at them silently, and didn't move for several minutes. She was attempting to imagine _that_ many different people, so many you would never meet all of them, no matter how long you lived. She couldn't. She could barely understand the idea of there being that many living, thinking, _being_ people in the _world_. Later, feeling a little guilty at doubting Evie and Aran's words, she asked Éowyn.

When Éowyn heard the question she swept her golden hair back behind her shoulders, and, laughter lighting up her face, grabbed Ilesté's hand. They ran outside (Ilesté slightly nervous; what was she going to be shown?) into the corridor and along it, into a room she had only been in very briefly before. It was medium-sized, but the wood in here was just noticeable more polished, and the chairs had simple patterns carved on them. Éowyn dropped her hand, rushed to the shelf and snatched a green volume from it. Hurrying back to the table in the centre, she let the book fall open and whipped a yellowing, folded piece of paper out.

"Come Ilesté!" She looked up at her, still smiling. Ilesté came to the table, which was about half her height, and stared intrigued as Éowyn unfolded the paper. It covered most of the table. Éowyn met the waiting Ilesté's stare, her face now solemn but her eyes and the edges of her mouth still kindled that brilliance which had shone so briefly. She brushed her hand, in a great arc, over the map.

"This, Ilesté, is our world."

She watched as the child gazed at the piece of paper. She watched the amazed, glorious smile transform her face, which was normally so serious.

"Where are _we_?" enquired Ilesté, quietly inquisitive as ever, but in a voice tinged with wonder. Éowyn pointed.

"Here," she said, and placed her finger by a small dot with a label that Ilesté couldn't read, "and this is where we're going."

_A huge thank you if you are reading this! You, yes **you**, are wonderful!! Please review to let me know how many wonderful people there are in the world! _


	18. Chapter 18

**Hobbits and Heroes**

_A/N- A HUGE Thank you for reading this. I have been having mild writers' block but hopefully it has passed, because I like this story and am determined to finish it and to finish it well! If you have any suggestions about this PLEASE review, and if you have any comments AT ALL. Now, let's get on._

_To recap: Ilesté is travelling with the King and Queen, and their children Aran, Evie and Gideon. Also with them are Éowyn and Faramir, who are the people who stumbled across Ilesté when she was living alone in one of the foothills of a mountain range, and curious about this child, took her with them to Lake Nenuial and the royal house there. They taught her to speak, but she cannot tell them anything much about her childhood, as she remembers only waking up in a hill sometime before they found her. The children have befriended her (particularly Evie, who is around her age) but there were two frightening incidents involving an elf with vivid green eyes, who has twice tried to kidnap one of the Royal Princes. However, nothing has been seen of him during their passage down the River Baranduin, known by the hobbits they are now visiting as the Brandywine._

The grass was flattened into the muddy earth by the tread of many feet, and the trees dripped onto their heads, limp, sodden leaves hanging down. Many of these leaves had already fallen and lay on the ground as a damp, decaying sludge. Each step left a footprint as they walked down from the bridge, but after every individual print had been swallowed by those following it, it became impossible to recognise that these footprints were slightly smaller than humans'.

They belonged to a group of twenty sturdy, if soaked, hobbits as they trekked to the river's edge. The boat had only been sighted several minutes before – not as much warning as had been expected, due to the haze of grey cloud that made discerning anything in the distance near impossible, particularly on the grey-brown river. As a result, most of the hobbits were puffing slightly by the time they reached the rest of the group, who were huddled a metre away from the sluggishly moving water. With their thick raincoats pulled around them, the hobbits waited for the boat.

Ilesté tried to appear inconspicuous as she jumped across to the bank after Evie and Aran. However, no matter how small and slight a child may be, when their existence is not expected, it's quite hard to remain unnoticed. Ilesté averted her eyes, and nervously stood, looking at the ground.

"Hey – you OK?" whispered Evie, squeezing her hand. Ilesté attempted a smile.

"I think I'm not very good with crowds."

"I'm sure you'll get used to them. At least if _you_ trip over your own feet it won't be the gossip of the city the next day! I did that once…" They giggled.

Fortunately for Ilesté, there are few better distractions for a crowd than the King of Gondor and his beautiful elven Queen gracefully disembarking, with a noble lord and an equally noble (if _spirited_) lady directly behind them. One of the hobbits stepped forward. He had light brown hair and a cheerful voice as he gave a brief speech. One of the hobbits beside him, distinctively arrayed in bright chain mail, was virtually hopping with excitement, and kept glancing at the similarly arrayed hobbit on the speaker's other side, who was trying not to let his own excitement react under the watching eye of his wife. Seeing these two, Éowyn was attempting to conceal her laughter, and Aragorn, Ilesté observed, though his face was as kingly as appropriate for being formally greeted by these curious hobbits and heroes, was just that; "as kingly as appropriate".

As soon as the Mayor's speech was over, and he had made a brief reply, his face broke into a grin and he strode to the three hobbits at the front to warmly shake their hands. The joyous companionship spread over the group and while the King was still with Sam, catching up with the Shire in general, Merry and Pippin hurried to Éowyn and Faramir, talking eagerly. Arwen, carrying Gideon, was conversing with Diamond Took, and the children joined a hobbit-maid on the edge of the group, who turned out to be Elanor, the Mayor's daughter. And so, despite the dripping trees and sodden ground, the company was merry as it began the walk to Bree.


	19. Chapter 19

**Bree**

He was smiling again. It was prepared; all ready. And they were coming.

* * *

Ilesté felt trapped in Bree. The people were loud, aggressive and prone to drinking large amounts of a substance known as beer. She thought it looked disgusting, but fortunately, due to her age, she wasn't obliged to try any. The streets were narrow, and the rooms were small and smoke-filled. She didn't have to _pretend_ to be ill in order to escape up to the room in the Prancing Pony which she was sharing with Éowyn and Faramir: having seen how Ilesté hadn't touched any of her food except the carrots, of which she had eaten two, Faramir quietly led her up the stairs to lie down. She fell asleep soon after he had gone downstairs again.

It was a strange dream she had in Bree. She was lying on her favourite hill once more, but this time Éowyn and Faramir did not appear. Instead, a black horse came, with sticky blood encrusted on its hooves, and writhing white eyes that never looked at her but twisted every direction in their sockets. On the horse's back was the elf, cloaked in black that sucked the light from the stars. He was searching for something, but he didn't see her on the ground. Suddenly the horse screamed and reared up, blotting out all the stars completely. It was directly above her, its flailing hooves about to come down on her and she couldn't move or _he_ would see her. She rolled aside and woke up on the floor, shaking and sobbing.

There was still no-one in the room except her. Quickly, Ilesté stood up, and went over to the window. It only opened partway but the air that came into the room was fresh and cool. Wriggling her small arm out, she let the rain wash her hand. After a while she got back into bed, pushed the covers down to her waist so that only her nightie covered her top half and she didn't get too hot, then drifted back to sleep.

_

* * *

A/N: Thank you very much to Hunchbook for the glowing review! And please everyone (that means ALL of you wonderful people) let me know what you think! (Experience necessary in button pressing and typing 3 words: "Hi. Am reading." Or pretty much any other combinations of 3 words you can think of that tell me you exist!) Oh, and if any of you enjoy reading fairytales like me, (and no I'm not 4 years old; I feel about fairy tales what Tolkien did about myths and legends) please feel free to read my own, entitled "Kezira". You can get to it through my homepage, if you want to. But, just like Ilesté, you're not obliged to try anything you don't wish to – you too can be excused on account of your age! Thank you for reading! _


	20. Chapter 20

**By Starlight**

_A/N – I am sorry about the delay. I __**would**__ be very ashamed of myself, but I've been having fun writing the aforementioned "Kezira". So yes. I have to get a whole load of the storyline for this sorted out, but I'm getting there. I'm aiming to finish it over the summer holidays. Help, ideas, suggestions: would be brilliant._

It was many nights before the clouds parted, and Ilesté could again see the stars. She lay beside a white stone which, though cracked and ancient, still had some inner glow – a residue of the safe-keeping power with which it had once been imbued. She ran her fingers over it and she felt, or perhaps imagined, the dying force to stir a little. Then it slipped back into the stone, and into the past.

As quietly as possible, she sat up and stiffened as she saw the king sitting, with his pipe, and his long sword by his hand, watching the night. He suddenly turned around. She froze and then, reassured by his beckoning fingers, stepped onto the space of the damp grass and walked over, with fifteen of her small, quick, silent steps.

"You have slept?" he asked in a low whisper.

Ilesté nodded self-consciously and, feeling foolish as she realised he couldn't see in the dark, murmured,

"A little."

She thought it better not to admit that she hadn't, only dozed, and gazed at the stars and stone beside her. Somehow he seemed to know anyway, but he didn't mention it. The silence became awkward and Ilesté finally admitted:

"I love the stars, and the starlight."

He nodded. "Do you know their stories?"

She looked at him, surprised.

"You hear them tell stories?"

He chuckled, but his brow creased before he answered.

"In a way. They are each part of a story, which I hear when I see them. Fetch your blanket to sit on and I will tell you one, or part of one perhaps."

Ilesté obediently and swiftly wrapped herself in her blanket and sat down a metre or so away from Aragorn (and his glistening, sinister sword). She was just sitting down when an odd thought drifted through he consciousness, and softly she wondered aloud,

"So they're like us."

This time the king's frown didn't make her nervous, and she tried to explain,

"They're each part of a story, like us, and all the stories mingle and merge and intertwine through each other across the sky to make a huge pattern, that's so big we can never see all of it, and it becomes hard to distinguish all the different stories…" Ilesté trailed off. It was hard to explain, but she'd felt it before when she looked at the expanse of stars. She was suddenly aware of the king watching her intently over his pipe. He spoke.

"There was one constellation that truly was one of us, and walked Middle Earth. That constellation there, with the star that shines very brightly at the top. Do you see it?" She shook her head and he pointed. Then she saw it.

"Eärendil was a mariner……"

Ilesté listened to the tale, awestruck by its beauty; the way the undulating words followed the mariner's long journey and at the same time led her on her own journey with him, sad and yet finally uplifting. She was sleepy by the end.

"….The bright star is the silmaril, the stone that led him to Eresseä and the Undying Lands." He finished and they both stayed silent for a moment, the story concluding inside them.

The word 'stone' reminded Ilesté of the white stone she had been sleeping beside. When the time felt right, she whispered, puzzled,

"These stones, the white ones – when I touch them I feel something abandoned in them, briefly almost-glowing. And then it's gone again. It's strange, and I do not understand it."

Ilesté watched his reaction: he was surprised, she thought, but not really showing it. The king replied swiftly:

"They safe-guard the path to Rivendell, the home of the elves."

She stood up and walked back to where she was sleeping. Then she laid her hand on the stone again, waiting for its response.

"It's sort of like starlight," she called softly, "Fading, abandoned starlight."

As she finally went to sleep, Ilesté didn't notice Aragorn's eyes staring into the darkness, and his thoughts shifting restlessly.


	21. Chapter 21

**In Misty Mountains**

_A/N – Hello! Anybody who actually happens to be reading this. Please review. So much for finishing this over the summer holidays – but I know where I'm going now, and, more importantly, exactly how to get there…_

_Ilesté, a child who simply woke up, alive, in a cave and learned how to live on her own was found by Éowyn and Faramir, who were on their way to stay with the King and elven Queen in the summer palace of Arnor. They had encountered many difficulties travelling, but when Ilesté was riding with them they did not. Somehow, Ilesté made the snake leave them. Trying to find a way through a band of trees, she fell down a cliff into a river, and unable to swim, drifted, eventually into a lake. A bird saved her. A lady found her while walking beside the lake, unable to sleep, and healed her. Aran, Aurelen (Evie), and Gideon make friends with her, and Faramir and Éowyn are shaken when they see her, but she is absorbed almost completely as attempts are made to take one of the Princes. They leave, travelling down the Baranduin and meeting the hobbits, and going through Bree where Ilesté has a nightmare of the dark elf on a black horse, looking for something. As Evie discovers, to her amazement, that Ilesté has never been told the story of the Lord of the Rings, Strider is unsettled by her perceptions of the stars and the magic in the white stones that were placed there thousands of years before, to protect the path to Rivendell._

The sun woke the adults, and the group rose early, Faramir gently but insistently waking the children. Ilesté was the last to sit up, despite having been nudged awake again twice by Evie. When she did resolve to get up, however, she did so very swiftly, and was ready before any of the other children, though Aran soon stood beside her, by their horse.

"I don't suppose you would like to ride in front of me today, Ilesté, and take the reins?" he suggested with a rueful smile. Ilesté returned his gaze seriously, feeling guilty.

"I am sorry we can't take turns, Aran. I'm really sorry," she twisted her fingers together, unable to convey that she genuinely was.

"Of course you're sorry – because you wouldn't be so bumped around if it was anyone other than Aran you were riding with!" the newly-arrived Evie added, laughing.

"'tis true, 'tis true," lamented Aran, grinning.

"And most tragic for poor Ilesté too," called a laughing Aragorn from the other side of the horse, before striding around to check the saddle-strap.

"But it's good practice for you, Aran, to ride every day, rather than sharing a horse with your sister and taking turns controlling."

"Or not," Evie muttered.

"Not taking turns, or not controlling?" Ilesté murmured back, unsure.

Evie snorted with laughter as she easily mounted her pony, and Aran objected as he did the same thing, with not quite so much gracefulness.

"I always take turns, if you want to! But you never do, because it's a little bumpier when I have the reins. You _like_ to ride; I _don't_, and it suits us both better if you do it – so I'm actually demonstrating one of the main kingly qualities-"

"What letting other people do the work for you?!" interjected Evie. Aran met his father's eyes.

"Which…?–" Aragorn shook his head, grinning just like his son. "Anarion's Principle of Kingly Delegation, in accordance with the Principle of Purpose; you don't learn that until the year after next, the year before you can legally become king!!" he protested. "I see I'm going to have to _expect_ to have these things thrown at me, whether you're meant to have learnt them yet or not!"

"Honestly, father. They _are princ_iples."

Chuckling exasperatedly, Aragorn went to help Arwen with Gideon, and Ilesté quickly and quietly climbed up behind Aran.

As they rode into the ever higher and more rugged foothills, it became more quiet. They had left the countryside behind them, and had entered the great territory of the mountains. Damp, misty cold hung over the rocks through which they picked their way, and they were mostly silent, trying to remain inconspicuous to the huge mountains. They seemed devoid of life, as if they hid mist-veiled secrets in their midst and wanted none to discover them.

At about two o'clock by Ilesté's unsure reckoning, they got off the horses and rested beside a large river. She dipped her fingers in, tensing with the shock of the cold water, and then letting them relax, trailing in it. Evie came and sat down next to her, and Ilesté glanced up at her.

"If you need to know how cold it really is, you have to put your foot in." Evie grimaced, then began to take off a riding boot and sock, and then to lean over, toes stretched out. Suddenly, Ilesté threw out an arm to stop her.

"Don't." She had noticed something. "I think there's something wrong with the water."

"Why?" Evie asked dubiously, but withdrew her foot.

"I can't see any fish."

"It's too cold maybe."

"No," Ilesté shook her head. "They should be here, eve if we cannot see them. But I don't think they are."

"You think there's something wrong with the water – but the horses are drinking it!" Evie hissed, alarmed.

"They've already drunken it; it is probably alright."

Evie smiled.

"Perhaps Gollum ate all the fish. This could be a river leading from the underground lake in his cave."

"Gollum?"

"The creature that had the ring, and gave it to Bilbo, and was torture, so he shouted Baggins and Shire but Gandalf knew that in the end – do you not know about the Lord of the Rings?"

"Should I? Could you tell me?" Ilesté said, feeling even more uneasy as Evie stared at her. The rock was strangely uncomfortable and she shifted slightly.

"But didn't your mother…? The _whole_ of Middle Earth was _covered_ by darkness, though I suppose Arnor never really emerged from the first darkness…perhaps your village…"

"I didn't live with anyone who could tell me. There were no other people." Ilesté looked away from Evie's stare as if began to frighten her, but the only other thing to look at was the cold, rushing water. "I lived on my own."

"With your family?"

The fast-flowing water was clear, and she tried to look into it and remember. She could remember nothing of her life before waking up. The feeling of stone. The inside of the hill, with the drip of water and her, on the slab. In the centre of the memory stood the metal table, and at its head, the black metal chair, towering. She turned away from it, and back to Evie.

"You will tell me about the Lord of the Rings?"

"Yes. But not here." Evie looked around. "It's too real."

They followed the river up, steeped in the dark gloom that filled the narrow gap between two sheer mountains. Evie and Ilesté were particularly careful to stay close to each other and away from the water, and for Ilesté the reasons were twofold; she knew that she could not swim. At one point, the mountain on their right became a sheer rock-face and they walked along a ledge barely a table's width, with the river running fast and deep on their left. The rock-face leant over them as if to fall and push them into the river as it did so. They passed, however, and continued a little further, to the old bridge.

Arwen, who was leading them, halted.

"The bridge is here," she murmured, her eyes distant, looking across the water to another time. Faramir and Éowyn reined in their horses to stop on one side of her. The children halted too, behind Arwen, and last came Aragorn, who rode around to Arwen's other side as Faramir certified:

"The river has brought down the bridge. The water must have eroded the stone and it crumbled away."

"But…so completely," Éowyn doubted.

"Even the works of the greatest craftsmen – even the wondrous designs of the elven masters of old – are defeated in time," said Aragorn.

"Lost," Éowyn corrected, murmuring as she stared at the river. She glanced to Arwen. "Lost in time."

Arwen's face changes as she gazed across the water, as if she was reacting to something she was seeing, but she remained, held, motionless. Gideon, shifted on her lap, and stared up at her anxiously.

"Mummy?" he called.

She looked down, saw him and a sudden smile transformed her, beautiful but fleeting, as she rearranged him on her lap.

"Can we swim across?" she asked.

Faramir assessed the water before turning back to them, his expression grim.

"It is cold – but yes, it is possible. The current is strong – and swift – so if we should, we must take the greatest care. We could cross in a group, with the weaker swimmers more upstream…" His brow furrowed. Éowyn nodded, and turned to the children, her light smile reassuring.

"So that we can catch you if the current is much too strong, and sweeps you into us. Ilesté, you cannot swim?"

She tried, from behind Aran, to answer, but an irrational fear had twisted somewhere inside her, constricting her windpipe. She shook her head at Éowyn, who indicated that she should stay on the horse as it swam, and she would swim beside her. The others prepared themselves. Aragorn took Gideon. Aran handed her the reins and slipped off the horse. She helped Evie take off her outer dress and put it in a bag so it wouldn't weigh her down as she swam. Pockets were emptied. Jewellery was carefully removed and tucked into clasped bags. Ilesté watched, as if from a distance: perhaps from the shadowy ledge of rock far above. She might have seen something move there, but she felt cut off from everyone by a wall of icy water; separated, and she couldn't speak. Evie pressed something into her unfeeling hand and she put it in a place that seemed safe. Her arms and legs felt completely numb and useless as the horse edged into the water, led by Éowyn. Aragorn, Gideon and Faramir were in front and on one side, Arwen and Aran on the other. Ilesté looked for Evie, who waved from just behind her mother, amongst the other horses.

The swirling water was freezing, though Ilesté knew she didn't feel it nearly as much as the others. Pebbles skittered underneath her horse's hooves as they waded deeper. They were about a third of the way across by the time everyone was forced to start swimming. The turbulent water pulled at Ilesté's legs, sucking at the horse's head. She shook with the twisting animal and tried to calm her terror by whispering to the animal, but it could hardly be heard over the noise of the thrashing water, and the words seemed only to make the horse wilder, inciting it to splash desperately. Suddenly it threw its head back and she saw its rolling eyes as it screamed – she screamed too, a word she did not understand and somewhere, everywhere, the scream was taken up. The raging water was full of wings, waves surrounding her – Éowyn was swept away, her eyes finding Ilesté's and widening in terror before she was snatched from the water by huge talons – and a manic voice above her screamed,

"Take the elf!"

Air and water mixed, flying, light and dark roiling, and she threw out her hands to find the horse's neck, trying to stay on as it threw itself forward – the head of a great snake reared from the churning water and the horse twisted backwards, going under completely as it bolted, carried downriver until its hooves found rock and it pushed upwards, water streaming from Ilesté and she turned her head, trying to look back but snatched a glimpse of only the water as the horse galloped and she fought to stay on.

Ilesté crouched, her knees gripping the horse's flank, slipping as its body thudded from shape to shape, hands pressing either side of its neck. It swung to avoid things but her hands and knees kept her on and she gradually found the pattern of its movement, learning in her own way, to ride the storm as they hurtled along the path. Ilesté began to pray, as they thundered through a gully, that the mountain would not notice her, would be occupied with the others – she felt a surge of revulsion at her own selfishness, but it was combated by her need to get down, out of the mountains and back into the hills. She prayed that the horse would not turn an ankle on one of the hundreds of rocks that littered their path and she hoped, hoped and hoped for the others…for Evie, for Gideon and Aran, for Éowyn, in the talons of the bird; why had Éowyn been taken from the river? She wasn't an elf!

Suddenly they surged over the lip of a steep slope, and Ilesté was thrown forward into the horse's neck, slipping to one side as the horse tried to slow down, turning the sharp corner of the path but it skidded in the dirt and Ilesté was finally thrown off, gasping in pain when she landed on sharp stones and the horse's hind legs just missed her shoulder. Her head reeling, Ilesté clambered to her feet. Pain shot through her legs and knees but she took a step forward. To her right she saw the horse careering down the slope, attempting to get back up onto the path that curved very sharply away from where she found herself now standing. Ilesté walked to the edge of the rugged outcrop, and stood, tiny, on the precipice at the head of the gorge of Imladris.

_Please review. Thanks for reading!_


	22. Chapter 22

**Deepened Valley**

_A/N – Hopefully you will work out where this chapter is set fairly swiftly even if you cannot remember! I'm afraid this is largely a chapter describing Ilesté's exploration and contemplation – but I've always wanted a description of this place in the age of men. There are enough clues for you to work out exactly who one of Ilesté's parents is. By all means review with guesses! I would love any advice on how to incorporate action into description. Sorry for the terrible delay: I can only hope that you've been as busy as me, and will forgive me. If you can't remember anything (!) there's a summary at the beginning of The Misty Mountains... Start guessing! _

Grass grew in between the smooth stones, and only the dips, worn away by the feet that had stepped there, were left behind. The darkening trees had encroached from the steep sides of the valley, creeping in and pressing against the paths and lawns. Only the river was unchanged, flowing over the same pebbles and under the same intricate bridges that had spanned it for millennia; but no figures walked upon the stone, and no hands had dipped into its water. Yet the river did not sing alone. The wind swayed the forest of weeds and the leaves of the wild roses rustled, their shining hips heavy with hidden life. Water still tinkled in a small fountain and a group of fireflies danced around it. Others laced an edge of roof where a trickle of water had carved its way through the moss.

Ilesté walked between these groups of pinprick lights, letting them guide her. They did not cast light, but the tiny points _were_ the light, unarranged in beautifully random patterns. The first clusters had vanished in the darkness behind her a while ago when she came to a place where there were no more to walk between. Two tiny glowing dots were barely discernable in the arch of a metal gate that marked an entrance to the dwelling of Elrond and his kin. It was not large: not quite double Ilesté's height, and the wrought design was simple. She put out her hand, and hesitated, knowing that the same power that ran through the white stones ran through this gate. Was there a special place she had to push? Barely able to see them in the gloom, Ilesté spread her hands out and pushed and immediately her fingers felt filled with dancing fire, numbing them from everything but its painful burning, stealing all sense of touch as the fire spread up through her arms. Startled, she jumped back, and the fire kept spreading, unstoppably, tendrils reaching in to her heart. Suddenly realising, she glanced terrified at the gate, and saw a picture. It was the waves of the sea, with Eärendil in his ship, and just above, to the right, a bird – Elwing. Ilesté lifted her arm, waiting for her vision to come back after the wave of pain, and touched her, brushing the cold metal outline as she touched the space. The gate vanished as she stumbled through and the fire subsided to a tingling.

She was in a courtyard, though only the path around the sides was paved stone: the centre was grass, with a strange sort of sundial in the middle. Ilesté gazed at it, walking closer, and when she was next to it, she recognised the idea. It was a moondial. Resting her hands on it, all traces of the tingling faded and she traced the lines. The shapes were not quite familiar and yet she knew them; as if they had been traced over her before she was born and had never quite left her. Her fingers finished and she looked up again, and around. There was a door leading into the huge house opposite her. She stared at it for a moment, and it only took that moment to help her decide, with unquestionable certainty, that she was not going through that one. Instead, there were some narrow stone stairs that climbed up unobtrusively from a corner. They would have taken a long while to see from the centre of the grass, if the moon had not been shining onto the wide balcony to which they led.

Swiftly she ran over to them, the sound absorbed by the grass until she halted, almost overbalancing, as she was about to stride onto the stone, and placed her foot slowly onto it, across to the corner, and eventually onto the first step of the stairs. It echoed slightly, just between the step itself and the corner of the courtyard that she had come to. Ilesté felt a sudden bubbly of feeling that caused her eyes to widen and almost to smile as she pulled her hair around over one should and stepped up towards the moonlight. She paused on the balcony not quite so nervously, looking back over the courtyard, suddenly glad to leave it behind as she turned and walked into the room that the balcony led off from.

It was a bedroom – one knew from the bed – but as Ilesté gazed at the table with its mirror and brushes and carved wooden jewellery stand, she saw three paintbrushes lying with the other brushes. There was another table upon which sat an elegant box, beautifully decorated, but leaning against the table was a folded easel. A chair obstructed the door of a small cupboard. Strangely, it didn't look large enough to hold many clothes. Wondering what was kept there Ilesté moved towards it, but feeling that actually she shouldn't look, she laid her hand on the box instead. Cautiously, but compelled to, she lifted the lid, her fingers firm, fitting perfectly in the smooth dents she had unknowingly placed them into, where other fingers – similar fingers – had opened the box many times. It was a paint-box, filled with simple colours divided by the thin lines of its silvery wood. Some colours had been more frequently used than others, the dip where the brush had picked up the paint deeper in the greens and blues that the almost untouched red, whose brightly childlike tone still sent a small warmth from its little square. Ilesté stepped back from the colours, from the box, and looked around the room again. It was a bedroom, but it was also a room which had been lived in: someone's painting room. The someone had not been here for a long time: silver-grey dust coated the bedspread, glowing silently in the many-layered moonlight, and over the brushes, over the tables, on the chair. But her paint-box was untouched.

Feeling she should leave, Ilesté glanced towards the white door – but the paint-box drew her back, holding her there in limbo between this world of the woman who was gone, and the world that lay beyond the door. She should close the lid of the paint-box and leave the room as she had found it, but she didn't. She slipped our of the room and closed the door behind her.

Ilesté was at the end of a wide corridor, filled with dark and light. There was another, small, door near her left hand, and many doors dotted the hall. There were no paintings in between; it was not a grand hall, but it was beautiful. Quietly, Ilesté began to walk its length, towards the tall, graceful arch the space of which marked the far end. Looking at it, her light-filled eyes began to discern the carvings of a skilled stone mason, but they were barely visible. Her hand grazed the wall and her arm reflexively flew back to her body. She had been veering sideways as she tried to make out the carvings on the arch. Ilesté stopped and turned, realising something, to examine the wall. It had felt rough, and yet the wall seemed unbelievably smooth not that she could really see it in the stripes of light and dark. Ilesté reached out to touch the wall with both her hands, feeling. This part of the wall was further forward, and her fingers found cracks – but they weren't accidental. She reached up, her eyes following her fingers, overtaking them, and suddenly, her face tilted towards the ceiling, she understood.

The tree's trunk split into branches above her curving up the wall and all along the corridor other trees did the same. None were identical, all unique in small ways, with their branches reaching to touch in thee vaulted ceiling and the light falling through and down like silver threads. They pierced the darkness and shaped the doors into openings between the trees. The arch at the end, Ilesté could now see, gazing in amazement at the transformation that had spread up from her outstretched fingers, was another two trees at the end of the avenue.

Her wonder had pushed aside her fear, and through a thrill of fear and apprehension still ran underneath her skin, darting through her veins, an idea of what the hall might look like when golden light came tumbling down through the trees flashed in her mind. She stepped into a pool of moonlight and breathed in, once, and slowly out, imagining its ripples on her skin. Some of her hair slipped down to in front of her shoulder and she tucked it back behind her ears, randomly she remembered the feel of the long grass that she had played with the night she chose her name. She heard the four sounds again and smiled. They seemed to acquire a new meaning here under the trees that could almost be heard and their leaves that moved only with the change in the starlight, and the wind that blows a cloud across the moon to blot its light, until it passes.

She could fear the elves who had made this place, and she knew she still did, but she recognised something in this place, and felt a part of herself respond to it. They were the same stars that had inspired her, and given her who she was; her name; her self; small as she was, they were part of her; in the avenue of trees, in the metal gate, in the stones of the paths, in the pattern of the moondial; it was all derived from the same starlight. It had stirred in the white stone when she touched it, as if it had recognised her. And now, with clear silver light cutting the darkness and her slight body and her eyes completely still, she comprehended it.

Finally Ilesté stepped out of the moonlight. She didn't understand everything but she knew that these people, or rather, the abandoned home of these people who had been so like her would help her understand much of what she didn't and much of what she knew already. Smiling again, she recalled the way she had by chance answered Éowyn's question when she had asked "Who are you?" and Ilesté had unknowing answered – speaking her name.


	23. Chapter 23

**Perfection**

_A.N. – I was writing. Here I am, though, and ready to take up the story. I love it, but there is that _slight_ possibility that I might be biased – after spending a year and a half and, in particular, Christmas until this half-term on it. Please read it, and tell me its strengths and weaknesses. Or just read it._

_Love you all!_

_Ilesté has been split from the others and the group (King Aragorn, Queen Arwen, their three children, Lady Éowyn, and Lord Faramir of Ithilien) divided. Her horse saved her as they crossed a river but fled in terror back the way it had come until finally she was thrown off, the place of the ambush far behind her. She climbs down into the valley that she finds herself at the top of and makes her way through the darkening and deserted garden of weeds. After a frightening experience at the back gate into a palace, she gets inside, feeling an unfounded sense of recognition – her hand traces a pattern in the air above a moondial, seemingly of its own accord. She enters the house through the stairs to a balcony, into a room which feels as if it had been deserted for longer than the rest. Having looked around, she leaves the lid of a paintbox open and slips out into a corridor decorated by stone trees. _

Their palace was beautiful, and the combination of its beauty and the utter silence was the most frightening thing Ilesté had ever known.

She wandered, up and down staircases, slipping like a shadow-creature between the towering arches; she did not exist. Any light in this place could not detect her, in the years of desolation, for no light lit there. It had stopped a long while ago. It did not know itself. But she recognised these people; and as she began to understand their palace – the place she should have lived – she walked through their grave. Her feet were dirty, treading on their carpets: if she left marks, they were just graffiti of acid tears on their gravestone, leaving trails in the dust. Her eyes were wide open and her breath unnoticed in the halls of her fathers. There is no stranger sleep than that which comes when you walk in a grave.

She found a tapestry and walked through the door behind it. There was a bedroom there, with letters on the desk, carefully copied, and a dark-green hunting bow propped up by a thin, light book that would have looked out of place on the bookshelf. It was not immediately obvious to her that the book had not been put in that place by the young man whose room this had been but was the amendment of someone who had come to him here once, whose dear eyes had moved from the shelf to the book to the floor and who, frowning slightly, had moved it, before looking up at him. Leaning there now, it was just part of the room, a room hidden behind a tapestry in a corridor that Ilesté continued on down, away from the ship of Eärendil sewn above the door. She lost track of the floor she was on, of the direction of the mountains, of everything apart from each and every object she saw: noticed, examined, and assessed without feeling. She had shut all of them out.

Do you know the feeling when you sit with your arms wrapped around you chest and your knees brought up in front of you? Your knees are the only thing you stare at, and in your head a voice is muffled by the grey pins and needles that don't hurt. They're blunt and you barely notice them until the empty ache has brought down everything else, and slowly brought youdown sitting with your back against something, staring, silent, at your knees.

Eventually you revive. But it's difficult, pulling yourself out from the position- looking up with eyes ready to focus, making them sharpen again. The grey mist rolls away and the clear voice reminds you that underneath you cold hands there is more than just clothes and body; there's yourself. And so you are 'me' again, having to wake up and assess wherever you find yourself now.

The black battlements defended against the blacker sky, like spearheads against the mass of trees and tall weeds. The valley carried night in its veins, like a poison whose beauty is deadliness, slowly mingling integrating with the blood as it sweeps across the grass until the original beauty is completely corrupted and a darker magic is prevalent. The sharp fleur-du-lis of the spearheads could not protect against this creeping darkness. Ilesté moved her numb fingers, flexing her hands before rocking forward, pulling her back away from the cold stone of the battlement behind her. Her dress was spread out around her, crumpled, as she knelt and then pushed off her fingers, shakily getting to her feet as quietly as possible.

She stood at the edge of the expanse, surrounded by the austerely delicate battlements. The floor was riddled with leaden lines – the cracks between the stones – and they seemed ever closer together with distance. There were two towers: there would be stairs back down in both. Unable to stop shivering, she found herself walking towards one of them, quickly crossing the night-filled space, stepping indiscriminately, hoping her frozen body wouldn't be noticed by the hostile power in the lines as her feet passed over them, crossing their dark web. The tower's ghosts would not notice the life in her body as she walked through their almost tangible memories – but her swift feet knew that every press woke the power running through these lines. Her hands reached out for the door of the tower, finger around it and shoulder pressing against the thick wood until suddenly it yielded. Swinging into the close darkness, she closed the door behind her.

There were no stairs leading down. She would have felt the draught: its long-fingered current pulling at the air, reaching up from floors below. But this was not a corridor. Its air was perfectly still, but breathable, by virtue of the altitude. A circular room, she supposed, as the curvature of the wall seemed to suggest – though it was hard to tell properly in the darkness whether the room was as round as the tower. Trailing her hand along the wall, she made her way forward and almost immediately bumped into an object – relaxing after the shock, she smiled, remembering Evie's game of finding each other in the dark. Just as the rest of Rivendell felt saturated with memories, this room did not, and instead felt suddenly inhabited. Carefully, Ilesté made her way around the first object and promptly bumped into something else. This time she almost laughed before remembering the explosion of water, the cacophony of blurred cries and submergence, and the thundering silence of the horse's hooves against the mountain. The images came into her mind like little pieces of shrapnel, flickering as she tried to twist them in her mind's fingers, but unable to see it from another place.

Her eyes had just adjusted to the darkness and she lowered herself onto the bed into which she had bumped, swinging her legs up behind her for warmth. Something small pointed into her hip. She shifted her weight, alarmed, loath to bread it if it was precious; loath to touch it if its malignance could harm her. She ran her hands over the place but there was nothing. Quickly, she undid her outer dress and searched beneath until she found the lump in the space just above her hip. It must have slid down: a black bag that she had tied to the ribbing of her inner dress. Gradually, she recalled the thing pressed into her hand by Evie when she had been undressing before trying to swim.

Ilesté pulled the bag open, its strings drawn into the velvet folds, and tipped its contents into her hand. Curious and with apprehension she lifted the necklace by its silvery chain into the air in front of her eyes. It was elven – but it was Evie's. With as much care as possible in the darkness, she put it over her own head, pulling her hair through. The glassy crystal thudded softly against her chest and settled there. It reminded her of Evie.

Her head found the pillow. Where would Evie be now? Was she sleeping somewhere, with Gideon cuddled to her – on their own? Ilesté's wandering thoughts searched for a while, revolving over a map, and a river changing into another, before tumbling into the oblivion of sleep.

At some point, the darkness grew restless and altered, shifted into shadows, dividing and moving amongst still ones. In the centre was a horse with writhing white eyes which she recognised through her dream, knowing their twisting would find her. Then the elf was in front of her, looking down. His green eyes were fixed on hers. His hand moved down her chest. The necklace was sending out a powerful signal – they both knew yet he lowered his freezing hand towards it slowly. She snatched it, whirling away, turning, and opened her eyes.

She could feel her hand on the necklace, safely there. Soon her escalated breathing had accorded with the silence of the room again, and she listened, waiting for the slightest greying of black. The bed was cold. But morning would come, gradually.

After a long while of undozing waiting and listening there was a flicker from a small window above. Ilesté sat up. Warily and so almost silently she stood and walked to the door. Her hand touched the handle and, without noise, she gripped and turned it. The door was pushed inwards immediately by a gust of wind, and it was dying as she stepped out, just through the doorway. Everything was grey and thrown, torn, by the blustery wind; the weeds of the valley murmured and called far below like a sea of voices, their lament growing wilder; everything tangled in her hair and as she took in the view it alerted her to how cold her fingers clasped around the necklace were. She looked down at them and observed that they too were a shade of grey. Smiling, she began to uncurl them, when she raised her head. An eagle was there, huge against the wind and sky, waiting. Ilesté's eyes met its stare. The picture that the two made stayed like that for a moment, frozen, until the eagle dipped its beak. Knowing she ought, Ilesté dipped her head in return.

"Your sister must be rescued – other daughter."

She nodded, and then replied:

"May I fly with you?"


	24. Chapter 24

**Me**

_A.N. – thank you for__ reading and guiding Ilesté along, everyone. Please start reviewing again!_

Sunlight and feathers; a panorama of white light and rock and space between the immense crowns of the mountains. Abysses of air: with great but unseen rivers plunging through, their invisible force sometimes breaking over one of the few knife edges which cut across like tiny bridges. Hold by hold, Ilesté pulled her way along and up the rock to the shelf. She couldn't help but pause in awe at the height and, quiet but exalted in a way that she knew, sickeningly, she had almost forgotten, she thanked the mountain for her safe climb. As she stared at it all, committing it, absorbing her unique view, into memory, she wondered to which direction lay Mirkwood; which Rivendell; which Gondor; the places of the map coming into relief behind her eyes. It was hard to associate that tiny representation with the hugeness of even just the mountainside she was standing on; but looking straight ahead, Ilesté knew that she followed the cmuving line of the mountain chain up to the North, up to where everything would be covered in snow and ice. The wind, biting her neck, told her. Her old home was that way.

She clambered without too much noise around to the entrance of a cave and achieved a quiet slipping in – but for the fact that eagle's hearing is almost as good as their eyesight. He had been waiting for her for a few minutes. She held a breath, unsure whether to apologise. He ruffled a wing, indicated for her seat herself, trying to put her more at ease.

"There is no need to be ashamed: it is not something that you can avoid. You are more at home high up than we could have expected of you."

"I grew up in the mountain foothills, north."

The eagle stiffened almost unnoticeably. As an afterthought, she added, "Thank you". It vanished like smoke as it hit the air, too far from its cause, and Ilesté sat motionless, feeling very much the centre of attention with only this great eagle and her in the small cave. She lifted her head and – despite the movement seeming much too daring – she continued it. After a transitory moment of staring at the wall, her eyes darted across the grey-black rock to the opening with its fading sky, flicking back to her own fingernails, and settling on the eagle.

"Why am I here?"

The eagle met her eyes again and held them, and she had to summon up the new strength given through Rivendell to deep meeting them, letting herself be examined by the penetratingly sharp intelligence that remained unveiled by stateliness in the eagle's eyes.

It was only for a second, and then he answered.

"In order to save your sister."

Her sister again. "Surely…why am I not with the others? Where are they?"

"Across the mountains in a carrock with a hunter known as Beorn."

Ilesté let go of the calm inside her so it could rise to meet the eagle's. She had heard the name before: on the way to Bree. They had been story-making.

"Beorn the bear."

"We would co-ordinate the rescue, or whatever you choose to call it, but they would not get there in time." The voice did not come from the one she was staring at: it hadn't moved its beak. She broke her gaze away and saw the one who had just spoken settling himself in the entrance. He glanced at her.

"The two women are in the woods of Lothlórien – held by the man who has control of several stray mountain orcs. It takes half a night to fly there; it would take them days to ride. You must star out with me very soon."

The other eagle replied and Ilesté was left to think for a moment, the few seconds dropping away like raindrops uselessly hitting the ground. She understood that she was going to Lothlórien tonight, but the few seconds vanished before she could understand any further how these eagles expected her to save Éowyn and Arwen – and her _sister_?

They were regarding her carefully. The arriver spoke to her, his eyes quite kind, intelligence blunted:

"It often helps to remember where you have come from, if you desire to understand where you find yourself."

Warily, Ilesté whispered the answers. "The cave in the mountains. The stone bed. But– " She realised, knowing herself to be stupid for not realising before. "You know where I was before I woke up?"

"You woke up?" the eagles exchanged their equivalent of a glance, their beaks dipping towards each other. It drew invisible lines in the air between them. Ilesté didn't need to prepare to hear, as she observed the elder preparing to tell a story.

"The wife of Elrond was Galadriel and Celeborn's daughter. She would travel once every year to spend a month or two in Lórien, amongst the trees and the people she had been one of. Sometimes her children would accompany her: Elladorn and Elrohir, or Arwen Undómiel her daughter, though Elrond rarely went. Celebrían used to make the crossing through the Misty Mounatins, using the ancient elves' path that led through from the house of the Valley-Elves to the houses of the Lórien-Elves. We would watch over her sometimes, on the path. She lived on that path. She was much older, but still very beautiful, the year that she was ambushed on the crossing. Her horse was found dead on a stone bridge in the mountains, with all the bags: her escort had vanished completely. There was an eagle who thought he had seen part of it – a cloaked man standing holding the Lady's horse, speaking to her. He could not hear the words over the sound of the river, but it looked at a glance like the member of the escort sent ahead, come back to report. In reality, he was dead and his body never found. Elladan and Elrohir searched for her unendingly, and finally there was whisper amongst the dwarves of the Grey Mountains that she was trapped, far, far north at the very dege of where the dwarves would go. The Witch-Realm of Angmar. There was only one who would be holding Celebrían captive there, feared by men and by dwarves; elves refused to fear him, but they hated him. He had opposed the men of Arnor and the elves in battles which they could not forget. Many great elves were killed, and many more in the ones after.

Celebrían was missing from Rivendell and Lórien for almost two years, until her two sons rescued her and she returned, but Celebrían would not speak of what she had suffered. She locked herself away in a part of Rivendell which she had built, and painted there. But there was a wound, which she said was caused by a poisoned arrow, that worsened inside her. There were things she did that many thought mad, and she was strange to those who had thought they had known her. Her children recognised her. She left Middle-Earth, and Celeborn, Galadriel, Elrond, Arwen, Elladan and Elrohir, and she sailed to the Undying Lands."

The eagle's voice ceased. The story had finished. Ilesté brought her knees to her chest, clasping her hands around them, her back held by the rock wall. She leant her head against it, searching the opening of the cave for the sky, then looking back at the eagle.

"You were in the tower room that she decorated for a child."

"She decorated a room for me," Ilesté repeated. Like Evie and Aran and Gideon's room, and like her room in the hill.

"How did you know I was there?"

The eagle waiting in the entrance nodded in the direction of her neck.

"Celebrían's necklace." Ilesté smiled.

"We must go."

She slipped off the rock and made her way, quietly, to the entrance before asking,

"Where exactly are we going?"

"Lórien," the closer one replied.

"The trees – they'll stop you flying away. Won't they?" No answer: just the eyes of both on the back of her head. "Surely you won't be able to fly in either?" It sounded as if she was stating these things to herself, and she realised that they were just letting her do it. "How can I free them from the elf on my own?"

"Elf?" the first eagle cut in. "Is the captor not a man?"

"No, he's an elf." She was puzzled. Perhaps that was just an assumption she had made.

"Describe him." The other was becoming restless but it was a command. She described him quickly: his vivid green eyes, his cloak, tallness, the long black hair, very pale skin – and paused – his skin's texture was distinctive – how to describe it?

"Like candlewax."

The restless eagle had stopped ruffling and was staring at her, with the other.

"He is an elf."

"He sounds like one of her twins."

Ilesté walked outside, onto the mountaintop. The night was freezing, for the wind caused havoc beneath the clouds. The eagle's feathers would be warm.

They had followed her out. She climbed up onto the younger one at his indication and knelt amongst the feathers, her hands griping tightly. She was ready to fly.

They took off, and the wind was instantly fiercer, the eagles navigating its everchaging gullies while flying out of the mountains, towards Lórien. Ilesté knelt low with her head forward and her fingers entwined in feathers, following the wind.


	25. Chapter 25

Eden

**Eden****ic**

_A/N: __Hi! The information on fight scenes was absolutely amazing. I hope you didn't spend too much time compiling it, LD, but thank you v.v.much. I use it a little here, but it'll mainly be later. Everyone else, I love you very much too for reading. I am sorry there are such large gaps between chapters. You will, however, notice that they have become longer – not that the first one was hard to exceed lengthwise! Hello particularly to The Scarlet Serpent (I am not one of those people who has anything particularly against serpents and I wrote this chapter __**before **__reading your review so please don't come away thinking anything else…!). Reviews would be amazing if possible, but I appreciate all too well that there are exams looming (or upon us) for many…_

_Snowy Owl_

She was set down just into the trees; the urgency in the other eagle's eyes making her stumble as she slid to the ground. Her ankle almost turned but still the great birds seemed to have no doubts over her ability to get Éowyn and Arwen. The time had gone to absorb the fact that her sister was in the same trees, somewhere, with Éowyn, whose hurt Ilesté feared equally. She only needed to know where to find them, and trust in the eagles' wisdom to be right, even in their faith in herself. But the trees were not giving up their secrets for need, nor fear. Suddenly, she turned back to them. There was something, she was sure…

"Where will we meet you again?"

The grey eagle, the one who had flown her away from Rivendell, answered,

"We shall listen for you."

"How-?" She cut off her own question.

"Follow the path, child; second daughter of Celebrían."

Ilesté could not see any path, just the thin silver trees, like wooden needles in a storm of shadows. Their movement was unceasing. She edged further in, until the watching eagles were some way behind her and mostly blocked by trees, and gradually she began to make out a path. The tree roots over which it led were smoother, as though worn away by feet, and the grass had been reduced to earth in places. Though wide, its width wasn't constant.

She flitted from pool of dark shadow to the next pool of shadow collected in the earth. Her feet trod carefully and quickly on the thinner grass while around her the trees became thick and tall. Old. So old that they no longer needed to grow, and if they did it was unnoticeable to elven and human eyes – the only one who could have noticed was Galadriel, her palm resting occasionally on a tree trunk as she walked through.

Finally, Ilesté stopped, still. The ground ahead was a sea of rippling grass, with no path visible across it. Apprehensively, she looked up, and stared. Houses were carved from the great trees; roofs and floors balanced, held by the branches which they fitted among; wooden bridges had been tied on, spanning the small distances from one to another, and in some trees stairs wound, spiralling down around their trunks to the ever-moving ground. She wandered across the grass, tiny underneath it all, listening for any sound other than the rustling coming from far, far above where the tumultuous wind was throwing the treetops against each other. The bridges creaked. Éowyn and Arwen were not here, but the eagles had said to follow the path. Perhaps the path re-appeared somewhere.

Suddenly, she heard the sound of water, very faintly, but it was loud enough for her to follow. It was a landmark, so surely there would be a path in sight from there. The sound led her to the edge of the great trees, and stepping around a smaller one, she abruptly found its source. There was a tiny curving cliff, with stone steps leading down, and a stream trickling through. Ilesté descended the stone steps, noticing how the cliff was held together by rock and tree roots, and how on the side the stream came from there was a little bowl – a natural lip in which it collected and spilled over to the ground in a waterfall. But it was clogged with leaves and the water only dripped into the bowl. She tiptoed up to it and, using a stone which stuck out from the cliff, pulled herself up until she was balancing on the lip of the bowl. Reaching over the precipice's edge, she dragged her spare hand along and pulled a handful of sodden leaves from the centre. Three hadnfuls of moss and decomposing leaves came away. She walked along the rim, her arms not quite able to hold the edge of the cliff all the way around to the other side. She repeated the process for another three handfuls. The water was flowing a little better as she jumped to the ground, then turned, and cleared the rim of the bowl. It was trickling more strongly.

A short distance away there was a low stone font. Ilesté didn't understand what it had been used for: it stood too high and small for a washbasin and was too grand to wash hands in when anybody could use the waterfall. It was full of leaves too, and she scooped them out in double handfuls, placing each at the bottom of the cliff. When she was finished, she washed her hands, the water flowing properly now. She was still puzzled by the stone basin, and was unsure where to go to search for the captives. She knew it was urgent that she find them quickly but she felt, strangely, that if she just filled her hands with the water falling into the lip and carried it to the basin, the basin would give her an answer. So she did so, pouring in the water and looking at her reflection. Nothing happened. She was just going to get another cupful of water when her reflection changed.

There was a face looking back at her – a beautiful face. It changed back to herself again: brown hair, brown eyes. The edges of her face were blurred by the water.

She glanced up for a moment. The trees still towered behind her and the sea of grass was pushed by the wind, and the stream flowed behind her, but there was no other noise or difference. She looked back down at her reflection: it was different. Surprised, Ilesté's eyes widened and a second afterwards her eyes widened in the mirror. The change was subtle; her eyes were full of light, but it was a darker light, and Celebrían's necklace was altered. It was no longer clear but grey, shot with black lines.

Suddenly, a shadow from above flickered on the mirror. Ilesté made herself stay still, in the hope that whatever it was would not notice her.

Meanwhile, the reflection was gradually altering again; to the beautiful lady she had first seen: golden-white hair, blue eyes. Ilesté could tell that the lady had seen her by the way she was looking at her from the water. They stared at each other, confused as to the meaning of the changed reflection. The lady smiled, her eyes still staring but twinkling, and vanished. The mirror showed her walking along the grass in a white cloak, carrying a grey bundle. Ilesté saw her pause at the top of some stone steps and look down – at the mirror-basin. Then she turned, very deliberately, and strode into the smaller trees, hesitating at a large oak, she touched it, and turned so that she walked in the direction pointed by its lowest branch. For a while she continued, ducking under branches as the trees became smaller and touching several with an inexpressible sadness. Finally, she reached an especially tiny tree, and placed her bundle down in between two of its roost, placing her hands just above. She stayed like this, crouching, for a moment and when she took her hands away there was a hollow there. Pushing the bundle inside, she crouched in the same position again; healing and closing the hollow until the parcel could not be retrieved but the knot-hole was visible to anyone looking for it. The lady straightened, smiled directly at her again, and Ilesté was pushed backwards from the basin, flying, until she hit the ground with a crumpling thud sufficient to re-orientate her again. Gazing up, the fringes of the smaller and greater trees parted with their movement, and for a moment she could glimpse a blacker line of sky. She brought her gaze back to the earth, began to uncurl and froze. Something had moved. Yet there was no place for something to stand up there, and the leaves wouldn't take anything's weight.

It was not only urgency or curiosity that drove her now. Having picked herself up, she ascended the stone stairs to the top of the cliff. It was an odd feeling, knowing that the lady whom she had just seen had stood here – a long time ago. The wood had changes since she had done so and she had left no trace here; just the image in Ilesté's memory, but its detail was slipping like water through her hands. She counted off the turns on her fingers. Certain of the way, if only tremulously certain, she glanced into the smaller trees. She couldn't quite see the oak, despite her searching for it, and soon she found herself among the trees. Then she was by its side. Remembering, it was the lowest branch that she needed, but the lowest pointed back the way she had come. She circled the tree again, running her hand over it in exactly the way the Lady had done. Ilesté concentrated on feeling, the quiet of the wood lending itself to this, noise fading from the tree. It was the third branch.

She hesitated, feeling sick at the thought of how slowly she was progressing. Now she simply had to walk straight – and she recalled how she had tried to walk straight in a wood before to find the way through and had fallen, with a collapsing cliff, ending up in the river. Her awareness was brought back by the sensation, again, of being observed from above. More sickness addled her stomach, twisting tensely. She didn't have enough time. Éowyn would be killed. Queen Arwen, Evie's mother would die too – her half-sister.

The guilt made her fight quickly and effectively through the undergrowth, climbing around the edges of the tangled bushes and branches and weeds, ducking through when she couldn't go over. It was impossible to go faster, but she tried. After several minutes, she was using a tree to pull herself onto its roots for a few steps when she recognised it. It was one that Galadriel's hand had drifted over: she could sense it through her fingers on the bark, similar to the power she had felt rise in the deep valley's white stones. Yet it had a different quality. Her next arm reached out to lean against the next tree as she stepped over something; this one too had been touched. Realising how useful this was, she ran her fingers over the subsequent tree, lightly and a little nervously but instantly knowing, and did the same for the next, and the next. She picked her way through like this, in the footsteps of the Lady of the Wood; her guide. The trees became alive around her, and it was as if she could not see them, but only hear them while she wandered through, small but not as much younger than them as she should have been. Suddenly, Ilesté caught sight of the little tree, just ahead and to the right. But she didn't see, curled in its branches, the huge snake. Running forward, she dropped to the ground between the two roots, in front of the hollow and placed her hands around it in the way the lady had done. Concentrating, she sent her mind into the tree, feeling flowing both ways through her hands and through her bloodstream, she gave energy to it, and took energy from it; the roots seemed to stir, sliding into the crooks of her knees and over her calves as if the tree was holding her close.

Ilesté opened her eyes and the hollow had widened – become larger so that she could put her hands inside the tree's trunk itself. It was so smooth, like living stone sculpted by age into a beautiful form. The bundle was a cloak: she pulled it out and began to carefully unfold it on her knees. It had no clasp. In the hood were carefully tucked two coiled golden-white hairs, and a fragment of bark, inscribed. She ran her hands around the inside of the hollow to check she had not left anything, and her fingers nicked on something sharp. Carefully pulling it out, she held a little metal stylus. Puzzled, and growing inexplicably uneasily again, she sealed the hollow. The tree-roots seemed to slide over her legs, but the weight remained – increasing. There was a slight pressure around her torso.

She reopened her eyes.

The snake pressed against her and, encircled, she could feel its cold pulse rippling on her left side.

Ilesté's lungs told her she had to breathe. Hoping that her stomach wouldn't move too much, she breathed.

The snake contracted. Ilesté resisted twisting and tried instead to breathe in time with its pulse, quickly drawing breath and letting it out. The thick coils were tight, and painful. She couldn't breathe at all. Ilesté scrabbled for the little metal object. It was crushing her – she needed air! Found it! She jabbed it down at the pulse, under the scales. She had to press it through the ribs, leaning her weight on it to drive it in.

The snake writhed, loosening, and she stopped but the stylus was still half in it.

With one hand she held it and with the other she grabbed the snake's head and brought it to face her. They stared at each other coldly, her fingers keeping the stylus above its heart. Having pulled it out, the heavy coils of snake unwound around her. Their eyes stayed joined while she put on the cloak, and put the inscribed bark and hairs in a pocket. The stylus remained in her closed hand, held downwards.

She didn't understand why it wasn't going. It was hurt. But it only remained, staring into her eyes. It was waiting for her.


	26. Chapter 26

Brother of Mine

**Brother**

_A.N. – Climax! It's been being built up to for a while, and I'm very aware that it's not perfect…please forgive unsavoury details. I assure you that they're necessary for the plot, and they were always going to be challenging to write well. __Thank you for reading up to here, and I hope you enjoy it. And no, it's not the end._

"Take me to them," Ilesté ordered. An edge had defined itself in her voice, she noticed, but she just kept staring, forcefully holding their eye contact.

It was this tone that the snake suddenly responded to. Its head swayed at her. Then it turned and moved away. It crushed the twigs and pressed the undergrowth further into the ground as it went.

She had no other way of finding them, and time was dropping like the constant fall of leaves, even if it couldn't be felt in this seemingly evergreen wood. Aragorn and Faramir would be "too late": so would she if she never even found them! It was much too plausible as she surveyed the thin trail which the snake was making, and almost despaired at how she should follow it. The way was as thin as a line of ink, black in the darkness and the undergrowth. She could not go underneath the masses of weeds and groping bushes as it had done. Despite this she followed, willing her labour-intensive progress faster than before. Eventually the trees became further apart and she stumbled uncomfortably as she stepped from one root to another. They had gone a long way. She began to walk, it being easier now and remembering her scalpel adopted the technique of cutting the things she couldn't go through. There were little smears of blood on the ground which she noticed. After a while she realised that it was from the snake's wound but still, her anxiety that she might not be in time mounted. In suppressing this, she also ignored her guilt, and tried to concentrate on being silent: her guide had slowed down, stopping and turning its head with the invisible points of its eyes back to her. Her stare told it to stay at her heel. She walked up until she was beside its head. She was hidden in the darkness of the trees that ceased, marking the edge of the space.

It was not large, but it had been quite restful when it had not been used for a purpose like this. Ilesté could not see Éowyn or Arwen, only the elf's back. And then she saw that what he knelt over was moving; the tangle of hair, and earth, limbs and flesh was the woman she had first seen on a hilltop, months away. She had been human. Like her. The broken body stirred, but the words whispered were captured before Ilesté could recognise them. She couldn't make out Arwen's shape anywhere, nor the shapes of whatever had flown above the river.

"Saplings, my lady," His voice caressed her, "planted around your body? A cage?"

Éowyn was no longer moving. She was a lump on the ground, perfect for its stillness and brokenness. The oleaginous words continued above her, but Ilesté could tell how they wound their way down into her, burying themselves in the creases of her body as she tried to protect herself – or what remained of herself. So she watched, choiceless, unable to stop anything.

"Or shall I plant them inside your body? We have been so – intimately – careful so far, my lady, but if that's too…"

They eddied into a quiet filled with layer upon layer of voyeurs, the outer layer helpless to reach the inside. It was almost as if her presence had never been going to make a difference. She remained alert though, for she didn't know where the others were who had ambushed them. Words – Éowyn's – made her stand even more still, the snake at her heel, as she strained to hear them, and understood.

"No seed of yours will take." The statement was whispered, without valour.

"Why, lady – the moon? Is she not right yet?"

She saw how his hand moved down the bare skin, how it would have been pale as moonlight beneath its layer of earth. It was bruised, like the moon's patches instead.

"Do not fear. We have all the time we need. We can repeat this as many times as you and I wish."

There was almost scorn in Éowyn's voice this time, but perhaps it was simply an echo which Ilesté discerned.

"You should know that I cannot give you what you desire. Not even with a world's time."

Éowyn cried out and Ilesté snapped her eyes shut as the elf punished her; the brutality in his fury sensual to him as her pain, playing with her but never laughing. He tore at her skin in his desire to hurt her: desire for her, desire to penetrate her human body and be within it where she could not turn away. Ilesté had dropped to the ground, attempting not to hear or see except what she needed; the snake beside her hissed as she fell forward onto her hands and the twigs and leaves crackled. She didn't want to see. She could hear two sets of screaming in the darkness of the dizzy ground – she was shaking – the elf was hissing now too. She had been made like this. Éowyn was being poisoned – an arrow wound: a poisoned arrow. Poison. Her mother's necklace fell, hanging from her neck and she clung to it, her other arm supporting her; the snake had gone.

There.

"Bite him!" she gasped. Its stare was malicious now. She tried to order it, but terror and authority weren't compatible.

It was watching the effect its guidance had had on her. Her guide thought she was powerless. Furious in her terror, Ilesté let herself snarl horribly; and it fled across the clearing. She saw it strike, and bite the elf even as he stabbed Éowyn. She saw him feel it, draw out, rolling away from his victim and abandon her ravaged, infected body in his own pain as the poison was strengthening in his blood. Her head dropped sideways and she stared along the ground, until she reached Ilesté. Their gazes met across the forest floor and they held it together, seeking reassurance. Éowyn's eyes widened, noticing the light seeping out through Ilesté's fingers, which she hadn't noticed herself.

It was from the necklace.

Gazing down at it, both of them together now, Ilesté found she could move. She hauled herself up until she stood against the trunk of a tree.

In that moment, the writhing elf caught sight of her, and she knew that he had suddenly understood – something still a mystery to her. He had power. The pain in his green eyes was controlled as he studied her; her, unable to avoid them.

He stood. Ilesté felt herself compelled to walk towards him, feeling hollowed out. She felt as if his eyes had sliced away all the things she knew and widened a large gap inside her. She was only an empty shell with a helpless consciousness weighing in her head, her fingers wrapped around a stolen necklace. This was the object of the elf's study, until he flickered back up to her again. His face was twisted.

"You have cheated me of it."

He was talking about the necklace, but she didn't reply. She waited.

"You do not know how to talk, little girl," he sneered. "Stupid woman! You are waiting for me to die." His sneer widened. Ilesté said nothing.

"Do you know how old you are?"

She just kept staring at him; she was the snake, this time.

Someone else spoke, their voice quiet but full of contempt: Éowyn.

"You are falling apart, elf."

He laughed inhumanly and turned to her. "Such truth, my lady! But you will be driven mad by it too, whether I overcome this or not."

He swung back to face Ilesté and, in the locus of his dilated glance, glimpsed the snake. The elf hissed.

Ilesté watched, knew the hiss's meaning, and couldn't move. The snake moved behind her: she could hear its progress over the earth. It was straightening. The elf was watching.

–Her arm.–

The pain was incredibly intense, spreading from just above her elbow. Ilesté spoke, refusing to give in to the pain.

"So I will fall apart too," she breathed.

"It will be a good thing, will it not? You will no longer exist."

He was making her think of the way she had been made. Her fingers were slipping form the necklace's pendant – sliding down, and her arm no longer had the strength to make them grip harder.

"Good girl. Funny, isn't it, how one can have no memory of parents; can be influenced by no-one; and yet still fulfill the purpose which you were always intended for?"

Ilesté tried to understand his words but the pain was addling all thoughts.

He reached out for the necklace and she stepped away. A purpose?

"You are my brother!" Her final exclamation was a dull metallic whisper. He didn't reply, but continued explaining.

"Women were always better than men at infiltrating: the elves especially. Children are even better." He leered even as he crumpled, crushing leaves. She was still standing, above her brother on the ground.

"Particularly if they can't give anything away, because they don't remember!"

She was losing all feeling, but she could see. She could see the witch-king, in the cave; could recall the utter terror of a child, pressing her small hands into a reed chair so hard that they left marks there.

"_Very_ good, little sister. Thank you."

She was lying on the ground, the earth pressed against her cheek. He was holding it.

"Our mother's husband saw this necklace in a vision. His daughter's son was wearing it, and I have been trying to get it, as you know, sister. There have been – hindrances."

Ilesté had no energy, and she could not keep her eyes open. Her brother's voice barely registered in her brain; she was thinking of Arwen, whom she had thought was a dream in the rain, and the room in the tower made especially for her. The eagles – she realized that they were the birds that she used to hear in the mountains, when she was climbing. Ilesté smiled, her mouth moving as slightly as possible. There was something in between her fingers, and she tried to see the pattern in the stars. The cold wind was inside her, this time.


	27. Chapter 27

Family

**Family**

_A.N. – I'm sorry for the fact that everyone probably thought this story abandoned – again – but I'm hoping you've all been lazing on the beach (in the rain if you're in the UK, but this is August – what can we expect?!) So you've been far too busy to spare any thought for this. Still! If you do want to now, that would be amazing... please R&R. There's a summary a chapter or two back and you might want to skim the previous one, but essentially: Ilesté's been taken by the eagles to Lórien to rescue Éowyn and Arwen, who she now knows is her half-sister, and she was led by a snake to __Éowyn and her brother, the evil elf who's been after Arwen's elven necklace throughout the story because he thought it would make him immortal like the elves if he had it, since he's half-elf to start with. But apparently not, because he's now dead, poisoned by the snake which Ilesté ordered to bite him – though it bit her immediately afterwards. She, however, mysteriously survives..._

The pain was ebbing away, gradually, and she felt her consciousness grow to fill its space. It was easier to breathe now: had she stopped, before? The hazily-thought word triggered memories – she had opened her eyes. Though she tried to sit up, there seemed to be a veil in her way and branches – no, arms – around her body.

"Ilesté!"

Éowyn's voice reassured her. It was on _her_ knees that she was being held.

"I'm sorry," Ilesté coughed. She kept coughing, saying sorry over and over again, the words becoming sobs, her arm aching; everything was pulsing in focussed slams until suddenly they stopped.

Her tears ceased.

Éowyn carefully released her, and wrapped her arms around herself.

The air of the wood was very cold, despite the trees. She dragged herself the few feet to her brother's curled body, the earth scuffing her knees. His drawn skin was sallow and had traces of black underneath it, thin and spidery: the handwriting of poison. They might have been the veins of leaves' skeletons, faintly inked across his face and neck as if from years ago. She took his hand unflinchingly, and sat there, waiting for her thoughts and breaths to settle. His body and his expression helped her to begin to understand. But Ilesté could feel Éowyn kneeling where she had left her, behind her bowed head, just holding mind and limbs together in spite of her exhaustion which Ilesté knew could not come from anywhere deeper – and yet she was waiting for her. Ilesté took a deep breath and turned to face her.

"We must get Arwen."

Éowyn nodded but hopelessness flitted across her face, and at this Ilesté was truly frightened. Éowyn answered.

"I do not know where she is."

Ilesté continued to look at her whose face, usually quietly certain, was empty of resolve. Even hope barely remained through her exhaustion, and they both knew it.

Ilesté reached across the body to take the necklace from the elf's other hand. It felt heavy and appeared darker. Under the trees' watching influence, the curved shape still gleamed eerily. The trees held time; their roots in the ground beneath her held the marrow of ancient Lórien and this glowing necklace in her hand too was left behind, a lonely remainder. But the trees recognized the light.

"Here, wear it." She untangled the chain.

"What?" queried Éowyn as Ilesté got to her feet. Her smallish but sure hands held the thin mithril in an open loop for Éowyn's head.

"It will help you," she said dully, and Éowyn dipped her head and then pulled her hair out from underneath the silver chain, not questioning the truth of the girl's statement as she saw the firm knowledge buried in her eyes. The pendant rested on her bare breast. She glanced worriedly at Ilesté, feeling sacrilegious but Ilesté was observing the pendant.

"It's doing something." She tried to help Éowyn up. "How shall we find her?"

Éowyn was dizzy with pain as the blood rushed from her head but the necklace did indeed seem to give the area it touched faint relief. She did not know that it was to the necklace that her exhaustion was drawn down but she felt her head clear.

"We have to search for her."

"Have you any idea where? Or of the direction?"

She shook her head. "I never saw which direction–" she hesitated, the lines creasing her bloodied forehead as she took care to form her words, "the elf came from. Though it was not far; just near enough to be able to hear the screams of the other when I was left alone knowing that it would be me the next time. I do not know which way I was lying when I heard them last, or I could find the direction of the screaming..." She trailed off, looking at the mess of mud and leaves where she had lain. "But we could call again now."

As Éowyn bent down to search the floor for the print of the elf's foot, to see its direction, Ilesté drew in a breath to call. The ancient trees rustled, the darkness pressed down upon and around her, and she was tempted to let it out again.

"Queen Ar-wen..."

Her shout was absorbed swiftly by the near silence. Perhaps the eagles would hear too.

"La-dy Ar-wen!"

Again it was absorbed, but there seemed to be an echo. She had just understood, trying to work out what the word had been, when a scream followed. It was piercing and though it was faint it was not that distant.

Éowyn caught Ilesté's arm as she was about to run. She twisted, pain coursing down her arm, but Éowyn did not let go.

"Never run in a forest." Her eyes were fearful. "I can mark the way back."

Éowyn let go of her and she touched the first tree, then started to walk fast but tripped. It was the snake she'd tripped on. The deadly instrument of much, it was itself dead.

Éowyn hauled her up and they hovered for a second before she chose her direction. Ilesté followed. She was glad to be with someone but dreading whatever they were about to encounter, for something had made Arwen scream – if it was Arwen. Who knew whether the elf had trapped yet other people in this haunted wood? She marked some trees. Neither did they have the advantage of surprise this time.

Ilesté ran a little at an angle to the direction of the shouts, so they would enter stage left of who or whatever was expecting them. She checked the pockets of her cloak for something to use if she had to defend herself; or if she had to attack.

They were very close though the scream had long ago died away. There were only the bark, the strands of hair and the stylus in her pocket. A vague recollection of the hair in her fingers and cool energy running through her as it healed blackness troubled her. It had helped carry the energy – but neither the hair nor the stylus was likely to save her twice. Ilesté glanced around for an alternative weapon, endeavouring not to trip over any of the roots and give her position away as she ran.

"Put your hood up!" whispered Éowyn, and she obeyed. The branches were so high that there was not even a fallen branch to use as a club.

"What shall we do?" she asked. The days of learning to fight on the boat were far, far behind and away now, back at the beginning of her brave new world. They were hidden behind a trunk. Chivalry and pretence had disintegrated into this fight against the stagnant remains of old malevolence, harboured by dreams and shadows in the forested graveyards that should have been left in peace. Perhaps she too should be left in it, the birthplace of her mother. It made her less afraid.

"Can you see anything?" she asked.

"No. And I've no plan – not until I can see what I'm planning against. Stop!" She threw out an arm to catch Ilesté but the girl had stopped already and stood motionless in her grey cloak, peering through the gaps in the trees. Arwen was bound to a tree trunk across a smaller clearing, still wearing most of her clothes; her head hung down but her eyes were alert, scanning the edges for someone, though she did not see them. They could not see the reason for her scream.

Ilesté darted forward. Behind her, Éowyn pivoted to meet whatever the reason was, Ilesté assumed. She reached Arwen's side and Arwen stiffened in surprise. She was bound to the tree by leaf sinews plaited together.

"How do I untie these?"

"Can you cut them?" Arwen breathed.

The stylus was thin and cold as she sliced through them, the blunt edge pressing against her small thumb. One left: it was refusing to snap – but she needed to be faster. Éowyn didn't even have any clothes to protect her, let alone something to fight with. She was just distracting it: she wouldn't be able to avoid being hurt and keep it away much longer. Ilesté abandoned the stylus.

"Pull!" she hissed frantically. Arwen leaned her weight against it until it cut into her further, deeply. It was weakened where Ilesté had tried to cut it, but not enough – she rubbed it on the bark.

The two ends flew away from each other as it broke. Released, Arwen pressed the end of a rope into Éowyn's hand, who was dancing, tripping, away from the captor's sword. It was an orc.

Still behind the tree, Ilesté pulled herself up to the first branch with the rope. She needed to bring the eagles to them. As she saw the orc, a wave of absolute fury swept through her. Her grip was so tight that her knuckles completely whitened for a moment. Éowyn and Arwen, amazonian, were winding the other rope round it, working in opposite directions in blinked consultation.

Ilesté kept climbing, trying not to shake. Its deeply-ridged bark was strong and irregular enough for her to find both foot and hand-holds in it. She got onto the third branch. It was facing away from them.

She could not see what was happening. So near the heart of the tree, she could feel herself slipping into that awareness of it, partly becoming a part of it as it helped her upwards. Were the topmost branches steady enough to hold her?

With the tree's permission, she spread her consciousness until she knew the furthest reaches of its branches and roots. Then she kept climbing. A heavy foot stepped on her and Ilesté rushed back into her own small body, perched precariously high above the glade.

From there, she scanned the side on which Queen Arwen and Lady Éowyn were almost finished tying up the orc. On the other side, a large drop below her, was a second orc. It was bigger than the last. Too high above to be noticed, Ilesté was not in a position to help, or even to alert them. This huge orc had the advantage of surprise, and the others had no more weapons; they ought to climb up trees as fast as possible, and she would get the eagles. But that left orc in the wood of Lothlórien.

Sickened, cold fury twisted above her stomach, and was pumped through to her eyes and fingertips. She should keep climbing upwards, but she didn't move and instead continued to gaze down.


	28. Chapter 28

_A.N. - Brief summary in order...Ileste is halfway up one of the trees of Lothlorien (so she's quite high!), climbing to fetch the two eagles which brought her to rescue Arwen and Eowyn who had been captured by her brother as he tried to get his hands on the necklace that Arwen often wears, as he's been trying to do throughout the story, thinking that as it's a sign of the elves it will bring him "the right to" eternal life which he has as his (and Ileste's) mother was an elf. She was in fact Celebrian, daughter of Galadriel and Celeborn, married to Elrond and therefore mother of Arwen. Eowyn was mistakenly taken with Arwen as the whole company (Aragorn, Arwen, their three children, Eowyn, Faramir, and Ileste) tried to ford a river. The remaining members of the party are staying with Byorn, the bear man from "The Hobbit" but no-one in this glade knows that. The evil half-elf being deceased (as of the last chapter), and Arwen released from the tree she was tied to in this glade, they have just overpowered one of her orc guards. What they don't know, however, that Ileste can tell from her awareness of the tree, is that there's another orc lurking on the edge of the glade...enjoy!_

**The Language of Orcs**

The orc lay on the ground, tied. Éowyn had taken its sword and was holding it loosely. Arwen stood beside her, speaking, asking a question: Ilesté could just see her lips moving. With apprehension, she realised they didn't know where she was, but Ilesté remained frozen. She breathed into the tree-trunk, clinging tightly in her precarious position, praying that they would stop looking. She could see their faces, harrowed by exhaustion, and felt as if she herself chiselled their hope into despair by the final betrayal of this ending – and she could feel the orc waiting behind the tree in which she was high up.

Unable to do anything, Ilesté drew her breath in sharply, her apprehension fulfilled as Éowyn turned her back on the her, the face disappearing, and Arwen's – her sister's, looking more like her than Ilesté had ever seen before – coming closer. There was no weapon in her hand as she wandered forward to peer through the trees, searching.

The orc was a few metres away in the gloom: she felt in move, altering its weight on the earth above a root. The weight vanished.

She heard Arwen's cry, watched Éowyn spin to look past her; the faces of the two people she loved most, the black orc hurling itself at the figures. Its disfigured form was naked without metal. It roared but its companion didn't respond.

Ilesté saw its outline clearly against the darkness: deformed and misshapen. Her slipped fingers scrabbled against the ridges of the bark, grip gone and she was balanced, the tree and the air holding her as their daughter but she was still staring far below, unaware truly that she was about to fall – until an eagle flew below her. She jumped from the branch, without time to fear. The tree relinquished her as she dropped through the air; the ground was so close! Trusting, she reached up...

The following eagle pierced the canopy and dived to catch her, its talons locking on to her arms. She felt them, and her descent slowed with the great beats of the eagle's wings though she was still plummeting – unknown exclamations prickled her skin as if the air was trying to teach her.

Ilesté fell the last few feet to the ground, landing on her feet with her released hands still raised before the eagle swooped up again, and she crumpled onto her knees. The compact earth bruised them, unmoved as the silence though the shattered leaves that carpeted it had broken and scratched her outstretched hands. She could hear the breathing of the three figures in the glade. Arwen and Éowyn's were a little way behind her. Full of dread, she looked up.

It was close enough to catch her if she made any movement. Uncertainly malicious, its huge feet crunched right to where she was. Then it paused, and she waited. Her throat was clogged with air and she could think only of the smell of the forest as it loomed in front of her. It too smelled; a stench of earth, blood and the cloyed dark of underground passageways in which its race hid their twisted forms. This wronged race showed no mercy to its original elven ancestors – yet it was motionless. Her eyes roved over its twisted muscles. With a sickened shudder, Ilesté knew that it was standing in front of her as a child would: waiting for its father's order.

It could recognise her. It could tell that she was its father; could smell the echo of black metal in her blood – and this was holding it there, preventing it from acting without her saying something to make up its mind. Ilesté looked into its face, and her words choked. She tried again, her voice rasping strangely.

"Sit with me."

Speaking, it was as if she was blowing out candles from the back of her throat. She smiled unthinkingly at the brief image of her in Evie's house and suddenly returned to concentration as the orc replied:

"Why sit, weak master?"

It wanted to find out whether she was really in control. And it was suspicious of her disposition if she was – it suspected a trick. Disturbingly easily, Ilesté let the harsh tones of power fill her voice.

"I wish to talk with you. We shall not harm you. Sit, orc! You shall not stand taller than I."

The truth sounded unconvincing even to her own ears but she knew herself to be a worse liar. She waited again, but let arrogance stiffen her countenance. Yet she got the feeling that the orc was waiting for her to do something. Ilesté did not know what, but couldn't let the fear mark her at all.

"Tell them so that they can understand, daughter of Celebrian."

Its voice grated deeply. Ilesté could hear the nuances of tones in the words and the echoes that were clear in the pauses between.

"Did they not hear?" she scorned – too effectively.

"They do not speak as orcs. They fear you, master, for they do not understand what you say. The fearful are not to be trusted."

She had lost her position of authority in stupidity. She cursed – in the tongue of the orcs, and immediately vowed never to do so again. They were truly equal now.

Ilesté turned, unable to avoid turning her eyes from the orc.

"Éowyn, Arwen?" She was speaking Westron again. Their fearful gazes dispelled all Ilesté's necessary pretence of arrogance.

"How can you speak that?" Arwen asked softly. There was no hope, or even surprise at how Ilesté had betrayed them. Their seemingly painless assumption that all the things she had done, all the Ilesté she had been showing to them as she gradually learned, trying to piece herself together, had been false: the effortlessness with which the ones she was tied to so strongly could turn on her, mistrusting, told her that somewhere, they had done so all along. A cloudful of tears hovered heavily above her unperturbedly pulsing heart, and she forced herself to reply.

"Small children pick up languages well. My father spoke only the language of his Master, but I was left with orcs when he was away. I can remember their hands, their smell..." Ilesté could remember everything of her waking childhood, her growing, before the chains of frozen sleep had tied her to her block of stone. She could recall their rough care as they picked her up, and her view through a crack as she hid from them in tiny spaces, waiting for them to come back home to her cave after hunting; scared that the monsters would, but scared lest they did not come back. Scared lest they left her there alone.

The orc moved behind her and she turned her head back to him. He was sitting.

"Tell your elven sisters to come!" he growled, "and we may converse all together!"

It was a jeer. He still thought Éowyn elven, Ilesté observed despondently. Without feeling, she translated. Surprisingly, she sensed the soft footfall of the others as they approached. Perhaps they had believed her, forgiven her – or perhaps they had not. They knelt behind her at the edge of her sight.

"How many orc are you who would serve your master now?" she asked, the words fitting naturally into the slavery and battle tongue of orcs. She was no longer frightened, for the language of orcs had no tolerance of fear.

"There were only two who could come into the wood."

So the enchantment that lingered here had kept up a barrier to them still. But two had been able to enter. Ilesté did not doubt its truth, despite the feeling that this orc was human enough to be deceitful.

"Where do the others skulk and hunt outside?"

It did not reply for a long while. As it opened its black lips to finally speak, she realised that she should have been deciding how to get to the eagles, but she had instead been deciding how to ask her true question.

"They are scattered. The group has disbanded, for when no will directs us, we roam, sometimes in packs for hunting. This was how your brother gathered the group."

Ilesté nodded, not breaking eye contact.

"And you yourselves are hunted by humans. Would you serve me, who speaks your tongue and was sculpted in your hands, if I keep them from you?"

The orc laughed horribly, and she suddenly sensed the suffering emanating from it, channelled into anger and control, that rose in the laughter. Its great form was pulled apart by the humanity of its mind.

"It's like me," she murmured, so quietly that the orc did not realise she had spoken through its laughter.

But Éowyn realised that she had switched to Westron and lifted her gaze. Dogged hope glimmered in the rim of her eyes, lit by the elven necklace which was still glowing on her bare breast and casting a play of cobweb light over her. The set of her curving mouth refused to debase itself by begging, and yet pleaded with Ilesté for some answer or release. Arwen sat in the darkness. Ilesté did not know what she saw there, in the dirt and leaves and grass; what long-fled companion had stepped there once – recorded only, in this world, in her sister's sea of bittersweet memories.

Ilesté regained the courage to address the orc again. He had stopped laughing, so silence pervaded.

"You are...similar to me," she suggested, not letting herself be tentative. Uncertain nevertheless, but following the connection she began to explain, trying to piece it together as she thought aloud. The orc only watched her. "The way we were created: for revenge. And then I was given a purpose by my father: by those who twisted us and crafted us through it."

"You can never know the agony of our creation," he grated, bitterness in his voice.

His words made Ilesté feel something newly broken in her mind, past the cracked wall that had sealed off her memories: and the snake's poison, the thoughts which that had given her, had broken the wall. It was why she had felt so much more space in her mind as the pain had ebbed away.

"I have heard this conversation before." She was puzzled for a moment as she searched for it. "My mother and an orc spoke of it. She was trying to understand something, and to persuade him to do something."

An image of her mother, undefined through her child's eyes, fluttered through her thoughts. She was sitting, tiny, her back against slate shelves while her mother leant against a wide rock ledge, noon-day golden hair paled by the darkness of their prison. There was a monster talking to her mother and her mother was listening so, careful not to fidget, Ilesté tried to listen too.

The image went, and as it vanished she could not recall the language she had last spoken in but she forgot about it, and stared at the monster which she was sitting four feet away from again, this time under the great vaults of her mother's trees. _She_ was talking now.

Cold, the older Ilesté glanced at her mother's necklace. Éowyn's gaze caught hers and she suddenly took off the necklace and passed it to her. It was slightly warm, and the light shone again through her fingers, comfortingly now that she could place its colour.

"Try this," she murmured, in orkish. All four of them watched the mithril chain collect like water in her cupped hands, trying to slide through the gaps between her fingers, as Éowyn carefully dropped it in. For the second time, the girl opened it into a loop for a head larger than her own, through she was uncertain of the effect it would have this time. There was an unbelievable amount to heal. She shuffled forward on her knees and laid it around the orc's neck. It bumped, twisting against his grey, leathery skin, mud coating its sharp edges, smearing across the crystal.

The orc watched it; suspicion, hope and revulsion mixing on its bestial, human face. Ilesté was mesmerised by the altering quality of the light, and she knew the others stared at it also: for as the light fluctuated, strands of darkness were appearing, growing in the crystal pendant. The tiny black threads began to intertwine and merge as they watched.

Ilesté's intent gaze drifted up across the chest to the face. She could not place the emotions creeping into it. They were gradual – and certainly never seen before on such a face. She continued to stare, waiting for whatever the necklace was changing to become clearer. The seconds ticked onwards, and were lost in the leaves.

Suddenly, the orc swayed and lithely crumpled backwards. In the moment before it thudded on the ground, Ilesté realised – too late – that pain had come into the face of the orc. But it had not fought it. Ilesté jumped up to run to where its head had landed, hoping desperately.

The huge body sprawled, spread-eagled; its head lying on the earth which had been scuffed earlier by its hesitating feet. Touching the earth too, the necklace shone dully like a painted image of the moon. It was cooling. The dark lines inside formed so complex a network of blood vessels that the individual veins could not be distinguished, but Ilesté saw, too clearly, the orc's darkness in the crystal begin to dissipate. She studied its face. In what should have been the anger-filled passageways and crevices of its warm face, there was resignation. The life had fled.

No-one moved, in the wood; not orc, not the elven lady, not the naked human, and not the other: the slight silhouette of the ancient child.

_A.N. – Please review! Thank you so much for reading even if you don't, and I hope you weren't overdosed on cliché's too many times!! I also apologise for any inconsistencies: if you spot them, please point them out...and I hope everyone's had a great weekend__! Just to reiterate – REVIEW or else I'm going to feel as lonely and worthless as Ilesté..._


	29. Chapter 29

**Evie**

_AN - Sorry as usual for the delay... Thanks to all my wonderful reviewers from the last chapter! This is a chapter that goes very closely with the next one so I'll try and get the other one up tomorrow or the day after. It doesn't have a lot of action because I wanted to put in a chapter focussing a little more on relationships, as I know Ileste can seem slightly detached. She doesn't wear her heart on her sleeve but she does feel..._

The sun was setting behind Mount Mindolluin as they rode, climbing up the twisting cobbled streets through Minas Tirith; whenever Ilesté glanced behind – the way they had already ridden – the buildings were clothed in smoothing shadows, as if darkness swept up their footprints as soon as their feet had passed. The King was leading their small column, but Ilesté still felt conspicuous behind Arwen, who rode last. Not too many people were watching, since most were eating their supper at this hour, but the few who did greeted their royal family with warm deference, bowing and calling out words of welcome. Their confusion when they noticed her was usually well-hidden, but Ilesté could read it in their eyes; the curiosity and tense incomprehension. She knew she did not deserve any of the warm welcomes shouted to the others.

The seventh gate was still touched by the last of the sighing light as they passed through, though the rest of the city was submerged in grey evening. It was not late but the season of winter had started long-ago, it seemed, and these final days of their journey had been forcibly shorter and darker than their early ones.

They had parted with Faramir and Éowyn, Lord and Lady of Ithilien, at Osgiliath when it was still dark. Ilesté tensed at the memory, and the horse beneath her reacted. She made herself relax again. Her riding _had_ improved, but the weeks on the Anduin had done nothing for it. The days on the boat had seemed to go more slowly the shorter they got, as if the guilt and awkwardness stretched the minutes longer. They were her own feelings, of course, but every so often she would look up from whatever she had been contemplating – the marshes, the river, a picture – and see them mirrored in the face of one of the others. Parting with Faramir and Éowyn had been the most awkward of all. She had been with Evie on her horse, but she had not warned her that they would have to part there. Evie had stopped talking to her a while before, when she realised that Ilesté would no longer reply.

The children (her playmates and friends) were unsure how they should treat her, but Ilesté had known that would be the case. The thing which she had not expected was the mixture of betrayal and uncertainty in Éowyn's expression when she glanced at her now, after the thousand years of concealing dust had been blown away by the telling of her whole story. The other adults hid any uncertainty better, and Ilesté knew that her sister alone understood; she felt that Arwen could read her face almost as if it were her own. But the tired quiet prevailed. They had not spoken before, and they did not speak now.

And so they had reached the parting place and everyone had turned to look at her to see with whom she would stay. Faramir invited her, sincerely, to visit whenever she wished, and Éowyn had just nodded. They hadn't even touched one another to say goodbye – no kiss, no word. Faramir had endeavoured to make up for his wife's seeming incivility. And so they had parted.

A horn's triumphant note summoned her to the present on passing through the seventh gate. Immediately Ilesté was struck by the incredible space laid out before her: flat, its paths paved with the city's white stone (polished so that it glowed despite the settling shadows) spread the garden which made up the top tier of Minas Tirith. At the centre of the garden, where two paths intersected, stood a white sapling.

Staring at the sapling, the urge to slip from the horse and flit across the grass was so persuasively compelling that Ilesté could feel the grass beneath her feet and the magnificent branches reaching above her head as if she were there already. But she controlled it, and did not move. It would have to wait until some unknowable time when there was no-one watching – except Arwen perhaps. For they were about to dismount and enter the palace.

*****

The room was perfectly grey, with all the warmth and quiet needed to make her fall right back to sleep. The great curtains let little light enter, and Ilesté knew that the drapes bound loosely to the bedposts would make a cage of darkness for her if she untied them. Lying there, feeling the seconds creep slowly around the magnificently decorated walls – from the door to the window – she was in a cocoon of perfect comfort. All restlessness seeped from her leaden body into the mattress beneath her and the pillow cushioning her head. It was her thoughts, tired of drifting, which would not let her remain lying there, watching the minutes dawn and pass into one another.

Resigned, she pushed herself upright against the bedstead. It gave her a better view of the room. If she opened the curtains, she would be able to see which part of the garden she looked onto. Ilesté began to count to ten, but the word for eight would obstinately not be remembered in whatever language she tried. She abandoned it as a lost cause and slid from the high bed, already dancing silently to the window as her bare feet landed in succession on the dark-polished wood. Cupping each hand, she drew the curtains apart and looked out: onto an unremarkable piece of garden.

Of course, being the garden of Minas Tirith, unremarkable was still perfectly landscaped, but Ilesté had to suppress the unprovoked feeling of having been cheated of something. What was it that she had expected? She thought of all the other gardens she had looked onto.

Somewhere wilder; somewhere forgotten by people. She frowned softly and exhaled but the glass, already warm, did not fog up. She was not sure that she was going to fit into this garden.

She dressed, pulling clothes from the wardrobe which had been filled with some of Evie's for her, and checked that the elven cloak from Lothlorien was hidden safely where she had placed it between two of the dresses. If she was seen wearing it, she would attract more attention that it would deflect. They had introduced her, at dinner, as a distant relative of the King – some niece, in the vague minds of the stewards and servants – and that had been all. Not knowing how long she was going to stay, they had not made up a full story for her yet. Ilesté didn't know where the consensus that they would not tell the truth had come from, but she was grateful for it.

Leaving the door ajar behind her so that she would know which room was hers, she set off, treading softly as the wind over winter snow at first, but gradually stepping faster until she reached the great staircase which she remembered climbing up yesterday night. Ilesté stood for a moment at the top, her hand on the rail. There was no-one below. Pressing her lips together so that no laugh would escape them, she flew down the stairs; her hair and dress whooshed behind her; she ran across the grey and white marble floor to the great door; she pulled it open a crack just big enough for her and swung through it; and stumbled out into the freezing brilliance of the garden.

She couldn't see it. She walked forwards, along the path conveniently laid out in front of her – another thing that she was not used to (usually, she followed her own way) – which ended in a manicured grotto of bushes, flowers and a bench. It was too cold to sit down, even if she had wanted to.

The fountain at the centre, spurting tunefully into its seven recesses, ran fast enough that even the rim was free of ice, almost giving the illusion that the water was not cold. Ilesté was tempted to take a drink, but the tips of her fingers were already whitening numbly and she could not do what she wanted with numb hands. She walked past the fountain to look around again for it, but before she started to turn her head, she heard the footsteps through the fountain's concealing noise. They were swift, soft, and semi-regular: like her own. This was not a gardener following her unknowingly along the path. Whose steps were they – Arwen's? Ilesté stood with her back to the fountain and the path, and gazed out across the great plain as she waited. The city below was beginning to wake.

Abruptly, the footsteps ceased. Ilesté's curiosity overcame her self-restraint. She turned her head to look over her shoulder. Staring at her, like a deer who has just noticed a hunter, stood Evie.

She was poised to turn and bolt but, being a girl not a deer, was held in check by something Ilesté suddenly hoped was not just politeness. She could not tell in Evie's impassive face. Before the lengthening moment could feel stupid, Ilesté smiled and turned to face her properly. Surprise transformed Evie's expression almost comically and Ilesté laughed aloud as she remembered that it was because she had not spoken to her for weeks. Surprise modulated to astonished puzzlement, and suddenly Evie broke into laughter with Ilesté, as she realised how unnecessarily stupid she must appear.

By the time their laughter had subsided, they were leaning side-by-side against the rim of the fountain.

"Did you sleep okay?" Evie inquired. "You're up a bit early." She looked concerned.

"I couldn't have slept better." Ilesté smiled again, and raised her eyebrows. "I didn't want to move! But I think the compulsion to explore might have woken me up."

Evie's delicately impish grin coloured her features.

"Yes...you need a guide for that! Luckily the best one," she waved a ceremonious finger at herself, "just stumbled across you."

"A guide?" Ilesté queried doubtfully. "For exploring?"

Evie became more serious. "Trust me, you need one, or you'd never find the best places. And you don't want to get lost, especially not in the wine cellars; I wasn't allowed down there until I was eleven. They go right down into the mountain."

"What do they hold?"

"Everything the city needs if it's under siege: food, weapons, stored water. Apparently there's a lake right at the bottom, full of groundwater and–" her voice had lowered and now she stopped as if unsure whether she was allowed to go on. She had Ilesté's full attention. Evie shrugged, smiling. "You're family; I can tell you. There's meant to be a tiny, secret tunnel from the lake that only the Kings know about. I don't remember where it's supposed to go." She sighed ostentatiously. "We probably _shouldn't_ explore that. I've tried to persuade Daddy to take me down it – while I'm still relatively small – but he always replies that he's been through enough mountain tunnels to last him a lifetime. Which is probably true." She met Ilesté's puzzled eyes. "So I intend to wait until he's 140, and into his next lifetime!"

"Has the castle ever been besieged?" she asked.

Evie stared at her. All traces of humour were gone.

"You still don't know. You've told us your story, but we still haven't told you the whole of ours."

Ilesté felt Evie's thoughts mirror hers as she remembered that Evie had been going to, just before they crossed that river, but she hadn't wanted to tell it there. She had said it was too real. Ilesté stiffened as she realised that her brother would have been above them right then, having destroyed the bridge, ready to ambush them as they swam. Evie had good instincts.

Ilesté glanced around for inspiration for a change of subject. Her fingers were green-white after holding the rim of the fountain in the morning cold so she turned to face it and tucked her hands under her hair to warm them.

"Why is the fountain star-shaped?"

It worked. Their mood changed back and Evie became again her informative guide.

"It's one of the seven stars above the white tree on our flag. If you look at Minas Tirith from above, they're all in the right position. You saw the white tree yesterday evening, but we should really start our tour there. Shall we go?"

Ilesté smiled solemnly. That was where she had been heading all along. She threaded her arm through Evie's.

"Do let's," she replied, without a trace of sarcasm or ceremony.

_AN - As I said, I'll get the next chapter up tomorrow or the day after. Please review one of them! Have nice days...*_* Brown-eyed so_


	30. Chapter 30

The Tree of Minas Tirith

**The Tree of Minas Tirith**

_AN – thanks __v. much all reviewers of the last chapter, and all readers! Here's the second instalment of the Minas Tirith part (which is actually now the second of three. The third is written, I just have to check a date). And I don't own a copy of "The Return of the King". Grrrr..._

"_You saw the white tree yesterday evening, but we should really start our tour there. Shall we go?"_

_Ilesté smiled solemnly; t__hat was where she had been heading all along. She threaded her arm through Evie's._

"_Do let's," she replied, without a trace of sarcasm or ceremony._

The white sapling of Minas Tirith was certainly the whitest tree Ilesté had seen in her short waking life, even if she could not quite give it the title of greatest. Its branches reached high above her and Evie, though it was only a little older than them. Its trunk had grown as straight as it naturally could in the time since it was planted, so that it was as tall as the top of the palace's first storey windows, as if to reflect the glory of the new kingdom all around it.

Evie checked no-one in the garden was able to see her and then stepped up to it and put her arms around it, resting her perfect forehead against its bark before quickly drawing away again – as if conscious both of Ilesté, standing there (though she gazed up into its branches when she noticed Evie's edgy discomfort), and of anyone who might have been watching from the palace windows. There were many windows, glinting in the early light where some panes of glass had been put at a different angle – almost always unnoticeable – but at this time of day, the secret was revealed.

"Sorry; I should really try not to do that, I know," Evie murmured, an embarrassed red flush creeping into her cheeks as she turned back to Ilesté and Ilesté dropped her averted gaze, "but it's a childhood habit. It was sweet when I was three."

The image that sprang up in Ilesté's thoughts, of a little Evie treasured by her family and – less directly – by the rest of Gondor, caused a spasm of pain to twinge somewhere deep inside her. At that age she had been kept in a cave like an animal, guarded by orcs, living in constant terror of her father coming. Evie was still standing awkwardly, throwing Ilesté back into the present as she realised she hadn't responded yet. She had a sudden idea.

"Why do you do it?" Ilesté inquired. "Do you think the same thing every time you touch it?"

Evie looked taken aback, but less embarrassed, at her strange question. Maybe, Ilesté theorised, restraining the excitement that had appeared at finding another detail to work out lest it affected Evie's answer, because they had hit on truth.

"Well...I greet the tree, I suppose. But – I don't use words."

Ilesté let one side of her lips curve into a smile as she thought about it. Could Evie have inherited the ability to do more than that, through her mother? Was that what caused her instinctive, hard to kick habit?

"Don't laugh!" Evie whimpered, having misinterpreted her expression. "You asked!"

Ilesté shook her head, patiently dispelling Evie's assumption. She needed the right words to explain, and as usual they were a little slow at coming all in the right language. She gave up. It was Celebrían's words that she needed, but she knew very few of those: only what had been whispered over her in her mother's womb.

"I want to show you something," she explained. "Is there anyone watching now?" She gestured at the tree.

"I don't think so..."

They both stared up at the many windows.

"We can go around the far side," suggested Ilesté. Evie nodded assent, then giggled, her eyebrows raised in wonder.

"I never imagined that _you_ would be making me do things I shouldn't be seen doing..."

Ilesté laughed in response.

"It _would_ probably be better if neither of us were seen doing it," she said softly. "I'll show you first, and then you can try." She looked at Evie anxiously. "You might not be able to do it."

Evie shrugged, gracious and careless.

"It doesn't matter."

Ilesté knelt behind the tree and placed her hands on it. She rested her forehead against it as well, so that her undone hair swung forward like a brown shield to cover her face, and she tried to ease the tension from her body by breathing more deeply than usual. Closing her eyes, she let the tree register her mind's presence before easing herself in to explore it. She could feel the life in the sapling, pulsing with all the proud energy of a praised and determined child. And it wouldn't let her in.

Ilesté was relieved that Evie couldn't see her face. She wasn't sure whether the hurt or the sick feeling of her hands having betrayed her would show most in her expression, but both would hurt Evie as well if she knew that her tree would not welcome Ilesté. She didn't think she was going to cry – it wasn't something she had done yet, not exactly having been brought up to – but she blinked several times just in case. Having cleared her expression, the ridges of the bark pressing against her skin, she stood up and stepped back.

Evie met her eyes questioningly and she smiled, feeling guilty at the white lie, and indicated that she should take her turn. Evie hesitated.

"Do I have to kneel?"

Ilesté shook her head again. Evie's dress would show the dirt if she knelt, but fortunately the one she had picked out of the wardrobe was a dark enough green and gold that it didn't.

"Just put both hands against the tree-trunk, like this," (she demonstrated again. There was still no response) "and send your mind forward, as uncluttered by other thoughts as possible so that it's just the idea of being _you_ inside your head-" Ilesté grimaced, disappointed with herself. "I'm not describing it well; I'm very sorry."

Evie rolled her eyes and they both laughed, relaxing a bit.

"Can I do what I normally do? _Feel_ "hello" to it?"

Ilesté winced with dignified distaste at this way of putting it, but nodded.

"And then stay there."

She watched from two or three steps away as Evie followed her instructions. She didn't know what she was expecting: it felt strange for Ilesté, being the one watching; happiness and sadness stirred together at the idea that someone else could also do it.

The minutes lengthened, and the angled window panes of the palace windows began to lose their exclusive radiance and hide amongst the shining of those which had been built perfectly straight. Ilesté tucked her hands into her furred sleeves to hide them from the cold. For a moment, she wondered if she was jealous of Evie, who had so much more than her in some ways. But jealousy wasn't an emotion that Ilesté could feel, let alone towards Evie. Ilesté sighed silently in relief, and stared up at the tree, feeling better. The tips of its branches were changing from bright white to an ancient sort of gold. It occurred to her that, fresh and young as the sapling was, it had come from an ancient family – from a seed, frozen in the snow. She knew why it wouldn't let her in. She didn't belong properly in this new Middle Earth, this fourth age.

"Someone's coming," Evie hissed, spinning around. Ilesté put a finger to her lips, and then stepped up to the tree trunk. She was much too practiced at this, she thought. She peeked out at the path from the great doors of the palace.

"It's fine. It's your mother."

Arwen was walking to them, exquisitely serene. The light made her still loose black hair shine with silver and gold, as Evie's would if she stood in the right place. It made the queen seem younger than usual, and she walked as if all the shadows of past ages had been locked in a special chest and left somewhere no-one else could disturb them. She could almost believe that Arwen was the person closest in age to her in all of Middle Earth – only a few hundred years older. Usually the age-gap seemed much more than that. Though the queen appeared to be regarding the tree, Ilesté could tell that she knew they were there, and was coming towards it to talk to them. She had had the presence of mind to put on a coat, but Ilesté suspected that even if she had not, the cold could not have disrupted her serenity with shivering.

On reaching the tree, Arwen kissed her daughter. Ilesté noticed that she did not touch the tree. Had the ability missed a generation, or did the tree sense that Arwen was a left-over from another age as well? Had she learned not to touch it? Ilesté's thoughts dissolved when the queen turned to her.

"I have something to give to you," Arwen's hands skillfully lifted something from around her neck, one hand holding her hair together so that the necklace could be lifted over it, "if Evie agrees."

Staring at the sparkling necklace, Ilesté shook her head.

"It should go to Evie. It's not mine."

Arwen looked at her with concern, pained. It made her seem older again, but the gap didn't widen to the distance there usually was between them. Ilesté just felt like one of two sisters, standing together outside one's home, trying to work out who a necklace belonged to. The feeling vanished as abruptly as it had struck her. It was Arwen's turn to shake her head; the inconspicuous but meaningful motion was just like her own. Ilesté would have smiled. It didn't cease to be strange that they were alike in something as insignificant as that, but different in others.

Arwen made sure that Ilesté's eyes met hers before she spoke. Her eyes, too, were pained but unflinchingly reprimanding.

"Why will you not take our mother's necklace?"

Ilesté struggled to find a gracious answer. Arwen's gaze was piercing. She had read the answer to her question a hundred times already; she knew why Ilesté would not accept the necklace. Ilesté decided on the truth. Not one of her strengths however much she tried, she thought, her stomach twisting tightly.

"I do not deserve it."

Evie stepped away from the white tree trunk.

"You can have it, Ilesté. I don't mind at all, I have lots of other things from my grandmother's family. Please, take it." Her earnest face and voice were filled with more concern. "I would like you to have it instead."

"Thank you," she tried to get her sudden, tremendous gratitude across sincerely. Ilesté now felt even more terrible for not talking to Evie for so long. She hadn't realized how much she had made them all worry. Another reason for her guilt, to add to her collection. She feared, with bitter humour, that there were more reasons than she could count even if she did teach herself how to.

Arwen was still forcing Ilesté to hold her piercing gaze. She wanted to shy away, but for the irrational hope that they would stop worrying about her if she explained herself. Or they would agree with her, and send her away. If that was what it took. The one thing Ilesté wanted, more than anything else, was not to be the cause of any more pain.

_AN – part three coming Monday. Explanation time..._


	31. Chapter 31

**Storytime**

_AN – this occurs in the evening after the last two chapters. I would love reviews, and lots of thanks and smiles being beamed across the world to all reviewers of the last chapter – to japete, MeldaTavar and Rae Simmons for their encouragement and comments, and to LD for your incredibly constructive and supportive reviews, and especially for the link!_

_I hope you all, and everyone else, enjoys this chapter..._

It was late and they were in the library. Arwen had gathered them there, all her family. They sat in their chairs: Aragorn lounging back, apparently relaxed but his roving eyes gave him away as restless and discerning as ever; Evie on the edge of hers, staring at her nails as she waited and periodically checking that Ilesté didn't look upset; Aran was perfectly still, but his eyes darted into every corner of the room and Ilesté felt them too resting on her often. Gideon was at Arwen's feet, and had to be restrained every so often from going closer to the fire. Ilesté had admired the room, which was actually just one part of the huge library, until finally there was nothing more to admire. She concentrated on her breathing. They were waiting for the queen to speak. For Ilesté, it was not a relief when she did.

"We want to know exactly what you blame yourself for, Ilesté. Will you explain – or try to – as well as you can?"

It was a fair request, carefully asked. She owed them the best explanation she could give.

Ilesté nodded, and took a deep breath. She needed to begin at the beginning.

"My father took my mother by force while she was traveling from her husband and children to her mother and father. All her escort were killed, and though one of the eagles saw, he didn't understand what he was seeing, and didn't intervene. My mother disappeared. My father imprisoned her in the mountains, and raped her, probably many times. That is how I was conceived."

"That is not your fault," interrupted Aragorn, with a terrifying expression. He had leaned forward. Ilesté returned his gaze without fear.

"That is how I began," she replied. "My mother spoke to me in the dark, whispering in Sindarin to comfort herself in her imprisonment. I don't think she realized that she had conceived more than one child, though she had given birth to twins before. When, after nine months, she gave birth, my brother must have been taken from her without her noticing through her labour pains. Perhaps he was more like my father – less elven, more ring-wraith – and didn't need to eat. Or perhaps he was given milk from one of the many animals my father could control. He was so powerful that even the animals knew to fear and obey him. I don't know what my father did to him.

"I was given to my mother. She kept talking to me, for comfort, and she used to draw shapes on my stomach to play with me in the dark of her prison. Often, she drew the pattern from the moondial in the courtyard beneath her bedroom in Rivendell. She talked about the stars – the _elen_ – it drove her almost mad, not being able to see them. So she talked to me about them. She missed her husband, her family, her people. My father rarely visited, but when he did, he did the same again. Her sons rescued her eventually, but my father took her from me before they came. She returned to her family, but had been poisoned by my father's rape and the wound did not heal. I think she locked herself in her room, and painted. And in one of the towers, she made a room for me. People must have thought the poison had sent her mad."

Ilesté's voice broke and she stopped speaking. She looked at Arwen's face; grief and belated understanding played in the shadows of her eyes. This was the period that Arwen had lived through. Arwen nodded. Across the room, Aragorn moved as if he intended to close the distance between them in two of his great strides and hold her, stroke her hair, try to comfort her – but he checked himself as she spoke.

"We did," she whispered. "She told us that an arrow had poisoned her."

Ilesté felt anger flare briefly. Her guilt was her own, and the idea of this explanation was not to reduce hers by loading it onto anyone else. She would never wish this guilt upon anyone else. She continued:

"Though I wasn't as useful as my brother, my father had plans for me. He let me grow, guarded by his orcs, in my cave. Sometimes he would visit me. I was terrified beyond reason every time – there was no getting used to it." Ilesté could see him and hear him now. She was going to describe him, but thought better of it. It was not necessary. "Eventually his visits became less frequent; he must have been more occupied in other places. He didn't visit me for a very long time, and then he came back. I can remember him standing in the doorway, taking up the whole entrance. He drew his sword – perhaps he thought I might have grown rebellious in the time since he last visited – but he didn't kill me. He ordered me to lie down on the bed. I thought he was going to do to me what he did to my mother. He ordered me to go to the elves and lead them into the mountains for my brother to kill, and then he made me sleep so that I would not grow, and would not remember; the elves would trust a child, and I couldn't give myself away if I couldn't remember. He planned to wake me up at the right time.

"My father's magic ended. I woke up. Unknowingly, I carried out the instructions that he had given me: although I did not remember them then, he had burned them into my mind by the fear of what he would do if I didn't."

Ilesté looked down at her white hands, tightly clenched together on her lap and made them loosen their grip on each other. Between the currents of their breathing, the silence was absolute.

"I didn't know that I had a brother, and he didn't know that I was awake. The end of our father's magic affected him as well; he was more wraith than I am. Half of him was falling apart. But he had an idea that Celebrían's pendant necklace, one of the symbols of the elves, would hold him together. Knowing it was meant to heal, he planned to take it – but he did not know who had it.

"He guessed the eldest child would have it – Aran – " Ilesté glanced up at Aran, sitting across from her. His expression was unsurprised. "and he tried to find him the night Éowyn and Faramir arrived. Gideon thought my brother was trying to get _him_. The next day, in the garden, he tried again and discovered that Aran wasn't wearing it. That was also when he recognized me and guessed that I would follow our father's instructions. So he waited for us in the mountains." Ilesté frowned, and voice was very quiet but bitter with repentance. "I should have broken into my memories sooner. There were so many things reminding me of who I was. When we were about to ford the river, Evie gave me the pendant. I didn't know what it was but finally I put it on – in the remains of Rivendell – and the eagles found me. If I had just been faster Éowyn and Arwen would have suffered less. Believing that I was going to save them, I took my brother the necklace, and it might have tipped the balance. But perhaps he was still thinking like my father – he was certainly behaving like him – and so when the snake bit him, the necklace couldn't heal him. Half of him was dissolving, and the other half, the elven part, was so badly damaged that the best healing was death. So that was what it gave him..."

She finished.

"But you were bitten by the same snake?"

It was Aragorn who had broken into the quiet.

"What were you thinking of, as you lost consciousness?" asked Arwen softly.

Her memories were very hazy as Ilesté tried to remember, to answer. She could recall the feeling of the hairs that the Lady of the Wood had left for her in the tree, wound around her fingers like grass...of course. Ilesté raised her head.

"I was remembering the stars."

Arwen smiled suddenly, gently radiant as the evening star for which she herself had been named, so long ago.

"The things which we saw when we were first made, and were amazed by, and named ourselves after... And so the residue of the Lady's magic, which will stay in her trees for a long while yet, healed you."

It made sense, but Ilesté was startled.

"The Lady?" she repeated. Arwen was still smiling.

"Our mother's mother. Our Grandmother."

She got up and walked to the shelves, running her eyes over them to find the one she was looking for, before pulling out a large, untitled one. It was black and ancient.

"Aran, will you bring me the pen?" She nodded at the table in the corner. There was a pen there. Her son jumped up and brought it over to the chair where she sat back down and opened the book to a certain page. It was covered in unfamiliar letters, not like the ones on the map Éowyn had shown her, but it was also some kind of diagram.

"This needs an amendment," she murmured, "next to me."

The queen beckoned to Ilesté with her other hand, and Ilesté stood looking from the side of Arwen's chair at the diagram. For once, she did not feel like she was hovering.

Arwen pointed to a word.

"This is my name." She moved her finger to the left. "These are my two twin brothers, Elladan and Elrohir." She moved her finger up. "This is my father, and our mother." Up again. "This is our Grandmother, Galadriel."

She took the pen from Aran, and moved her finger back down to her name. To the right of it, she drew another horizontal line. The black ink was distinguishable from the other lines only by the way it shone, wet and new.

"You belong here." Very carefully and slowly she wrote another word beneath the end of the line she had drawn. She gazed at it, pursing her lips thoughtfully. "You should have a second name."

Reading his wife's thoughts, Aragorn broke in.

"No, Arwen. I would give her our name and rejoice – but she does have a name of her own. It is right for it to be written there, even if she cannot use it."

The queen sighed, recognizing the truth in his words. She wrote another word and something smaller, under Ilesté's name. Then she turned to Ilesté, standing by her side and looked up at her.

"It reads "Ilesté of Angmar, born during the year 2509 of the third age.""

Ilesté stared back, not quite comprehending the unconditional forgiveness, and love, and even gratitude in her anxious sister's eyes.

"Thank you," she murmured. She was uncertain what else to say. She had said so much this evening. It was Aragorn who replied.

"Thank _you_ for being found, Ilesté."

"Yes," Evie added lightly, "I needed a few more relatives on that side of the family."

Aran frowned at her, bemused.

"For what? Your forthcoming wedding?"

Evie went crimson, and the quiet erupted into their familiar family hubbub. Ilesté could just discern five different keys of laughter winding among her own voice.

_Thanks for reading!_


	32. Chapter 32

**Garden of the Moon**

_A.N. - If you are reading this, please feel loved. Very affectionately loved. By way of excuse for not updating for about two months (you probably all thought that the story had finished, and maybe I should have just finished it there but there are a few loose ends needing to be tied up) I have written a novel... I don't know if anyone's heard of NaNoWriMo? Anyway, I took part. But that's all over now, so I just have to finish this off. Again, thank you so much if you're reading this... it's hugely appreciated. If you have any time, I would (as ever, of course) be delighted to receive reviews! Smiles to everyone, and I hope you enjoy this pleasant chapter..._

The unimaginable beauty of Ithilien struck Ilesté again as she wandered, slowly but purposefully, along the path from Minas Ithil. The shrubs lining her path had grown again over the ravaged earth, though it had taken several swiftly-passing generations of plants to absorb all the poison from the soil to the east of the gardens; Éowyn had helped her to replant them. There were even one or two saplings – thin, twiggy, and hearteningly determined to survive. Out of the corner of her eye, up ahead, she glimpsed a larger tree, tucked into one of the thousand crevices of Ithilien, between a little cliff and a stream-fed pool which, although not visible from here, she knew was there. She had almost fallen, unsuspecting, into it in her second month here but had saved herself with the tree just in time. The tree had become one of her special ones; the ones she talked to, and guarded. She lamented for a second that she couldn't call out a greeting from here, but she would have to do it on her way back.

The shallow steps down the cliff were narrow but dry today, and her feet pressed on them with an unthinking certainty. She descended slightly quicker. She didn't want to be too late.

The sunlight was dancing around her, making her eyes shine briefly as she passed through a patch and dazzling her. When the steps curved back out of the sun, she observed again how it brightened the colours of the stone, and everything else... The garden was beautiful under darkness too – how could it not be, when it was called _Ithilien_? The garden of the Moon. But it was beautiful in a very different way under her. The silver and shadows made the place an immense doorway, between one age and another; it was unsurprising that she had found her house and home here. But her thoughts were not bent on night-time now.

She reached the bottom of the cliff. A familiar figure was visible, her head turned back the way she had come. Ilesté stepped around a bush and onto the main path, and saw that it was Faramir at whom Éowyn's gaze was directed. Hearing her, Éowyn turned and kissed Ilesté, and when Faramir reached them he greeted her in the same way before handing her his son to Ilesté with the utmost care. She cradled Elfwine. His head was always heavier than she expected, but she supposed that she shouldn't be surprised each time, for his head contained the eyes that somehow had the power to accost her with such a force of curiosity. This time, he was staring at the necklace which hung at her throat, shot with its tiny black lines, leaden cool against her skin, as ever.

"We should get going," Faramir reminded his wife, who was gazing at the baby. Her motherly enchantment was understandable for _this_ child; and after so many years of believing that she would never be able to have one. It was as if poison had countered poison. The wound she had gained in the great battle of Minas Tirith at the end of the third age, killing the witch-king, had been the loss of her fertility. That had been what it had taken to kill Ilesté's father: a sword, and a woman's fertility to tip the thing which had once been a man back into the confines of mortality. Yet somehow the torture inflicted upon her by his son had given it back to her.

"Where exactly are you going?" Ilesté thought, for the first time, to inquire.

"Osgiliath."

"Why only halfway to Gondor?" Ilesté frowned. "Are you checking the stonework?" A tentative grin spread, sparkling, to her eyes. "Because you don't need to – I already did."

"You've been to Osgiliath recently?" His eyebrows shot up in surprise.

Nodding, she wondered if she had just let loose a secret which she was meant to have kept hidden in the memory of the great fallen blocks she had clambered amongst three weeks ago: unobserved by the ghosts; unnoticed, she was fairly sure, by any of the inhabitants of the west side looking across; they would only have seen her grey cloak against the grey stones as she searched for and climbed the way up that last remaining part of the eastern battlement. She had found the clues there. Becoming like part of the stone she had waited for night to bring the eagles back.

"However did you get there, Ilesté? Riding is not exactly a characteristic pursuit of yours," Éowyn teased. She was hurled from her memories back into the present to answer.

"I walked," she replied innocently – before realising the trouble that answer was going to get her into. She gritted her teeth subtly, waiting for the onslaught of further questions. Faramir and Éowyn were not her parents, but they might as well have been: after all, they had found her. And, on a darker note, perhaps the ownership of her had been transferred when Éowyn killed her Father. Though of course she belonged with Arwen as well, and all her family.

"How long did the walk take you?!"

"Dawn until mid-afternoon, or thereabouts," she remembered, calculating roughly. "I think I'm a fast walker."

"You are," murmured Éowyn, "amongst other things."

Fear, so foreign to her blue irises, suddenly transgressed upon them and she deliberately let Ilesté see it. She glanced at the mountains, always above them, for the garden of Ithilien was in the foothills. "Don't go walking _there_, Ilesté please! Don't climb in the mountains alone." The mentioned mountains towered, distant and very close, casting shadows and separating Gondor from Mordor. There was a shadow that smoothed their edges like a vague mist even when they should have been totally clear. It was from this, partly, that they had got their name. She answered slowly, hoping they could not hear any untruth in her words. That was one thing she had learned from being around people: how to lie.

"I shall not go there."

Faramir squeezed her shoulder.

"Keep it that way!" He changed the subject back. "We're going to see some of the men in the guard – they want to see the baby again." He chuckled. "And they're meant to be such battle-hardened warriors!"

"So no sword or archery lesson today or tomorrow –" Éowyn interrupted. "You can come with us if you would like to. They'd be delighted to see you again too. But there's no obligation, if you'd rather stay here."

Smiling apologetically, she made her excuses without quite knowing why she was doing so. She regretted it slightly as she watched Faramir, Éowyn and their son ride away on the horses Faramir had been leading. She knew she could still call out and change her mind – but the minute passed and she did not.

The tree was awaiting her, even if she didn't know that as she turned and made her way in its direction. The underneath of the long grass was beaded with the damp residue of yesterday's rain, hidden where the sun had not scraped it out. Its existence was, however, felt astutely by Ilesté's cotton-clad feet. Not that she minded. She was nearly there. The tree would be able to sense her now through its roots. Her fingers reached for the trunk and melted into its rough bark. It left lines on her cheek where she rested her head against it, content in the sunlight-tempered green shade of the moving leaves.

*****

The bird shuffled from one foot to another on her branch before beginning to sing. Gradually she realized that she knew this bird. Surprised and a little reluctantly she receded into her own body.

Now that she was using her own ears, she worked it out instantly and laughed – careful not to startle the bird who had journeyed thousands of miles from the witch-realm of Angmar, in Arnor, to end up in the same place as she. It was the bird which had led her into a river accidentally. Stepping back, she wondered if she could persuade it to land on her.

"Don't fear me, little bird!"

It was motionless, deciding whether to scarper and abandon this tree. It was bizarre. She could almost see its thoughts.

"Yes, tiny bird, I remember you. And your beautiful song." She was glad there was probably no-one else in the garden, as she would sound demented, as Evie would say. "Come! Or sing again, if you prefer."

It ruffled its wings, lifted its head, and began to sing again, delightedly.

She smiled in response, then received a shock. For she had not just spoken the language that Éowyn and Faramir had taught her. Her entreaty had been in Sindarin. Yet few of those words had been ones which Arwen had taught her in Minas Tirith, when she was beginning to teach her the old texts which she had taken from Rivendell, telling her about their dissolved roots in elven history. So some words of that entreaty must have been given to her by her mother, somewhere, a millennium ago. Or seven years of her life ago, if she counted that way.

There was something at the bottom of the pool hidden behind the tree. She knelt down carefully. It was a thin, concavely-eroded rock, not too large to lift. Ilesté adjusted her position so she had the strength to haul it out and dipped her hands in. It was oddly un-heavy, out of the water.

_Thanks for reading - final chapter coming soon..._


	33. Chapter 33

**Minas Ithil**

_A.N. – this is the final chapter! To anyone who has got all the way here, despite the lengthy gaps between chapters for which I sincerely apologize, I owe you more than I can give you for your dedication and support... I would particularly like to mention LD (again) who has been a wonderful reviewer, and I shall humbly beg (for the very last time!) for any reviews, even if they are one word long. As all writers and readers know, just one word can have a great force for happiness, when delivered in the right place! From all my characters__, especially Ilesté, and I... thank you!_

Ilesté's still small but relaxed hands placed the stone on the chest-of-drawers near her bed. Then, walking around to each window, she pushed them open to let out the sultry heat. Heat-absorption was an unfortunate property of the black rock. The top room, however, had a good breeze and it was impossible to feel trapped up here. She did the east window last.

Ilesté knew that it would be sensible to begin preparing her food to eat later but her thoughts lingered on the mountains behind her even when her back was turned to that window. Having crossed over to the cooking shelf, crouching down with her hand in the cupboard beneath, she took out a knife and a board, passing them up onto the surface, and twisted the knob. Water began to rush noisily into the sink. Leaving it to gush this fervently for a minute, she took a few potatoes from the chest in the corner that only the weak sunlight ever reached and, having dropped them beside the sink, was about to return for something else when the bowl stopped her. There was a crack on its side – zigzagging down to its bottom – that she hadn't noticed. It was ingrained with dirt, yet it made it much more beautiful. Perhaps she should leave the stone where it was, as a decoration.

Ilesté whirled around and twisted the water-knob back until it was tight. The water stopped gushing and was replaced by occasional drips at irregular intervals. Nudging the cupboard door closed, she stared with patient reluctance at the potatoes. The breeze wound around her momentarily and her eyes tried to follow its progress, but it dissipated and she lost it near the wardrobe. Despite having no-one to see her, she turned back to the potatoes guiltily – and then, smiling at herself, pushed them into the water. Staying there until it got dark wasn't going to hurt them.

Acting on an impulse, she retrieved her grey cloak from in the wardrobe, fastened it at her neck, and pulled open the top-right drawer of the chest-of-drawers, where she kept the inscribed bark, the stylus, and the thin golden hairs, lifting each out and lying them beside the stone. They shone as if they were sunlit on the wood, though they were in shadow. She gently touched the bark; she still hadn't learned to read what it said. But the letters looked familiar today. Ilesté gazed at their groups, but there was no pattern that she could see. The light flickered and though instantly alert, she couldn't look up: they were making sense. The sense was just there, ready for her to take, if she could hold it still without looking at it directly. The evening light on her bare arms changed but when she looked at the window she was disappointed, despite the expectation being so brief. No eagle was there. But they would come. She trusted them more absolutely than she had reason for, and they had given her their word in Osgiliath.

Hearing an unexpectedly loud sound on the rocky plateau at the foot of the tower, she went right up to the window and peered directly down at the bridge, trying to discern whose horse it was, or who the figure was riding it, but it was difficult to tell from this angle. She had been so absorbed in her thoughts that she hadn't heard it earlier. A hasty spot-check ascertained that the room was tidy, unless whoever it was would take offence at potatoes. She should have put her lórien gifts away but she didn't have time: there were a few too many stairs to get down and she didn't want to make her visitor wait five minutes before she could get to the door. Sweeping the key from the shelf, she ran down the thousand levels of stone. She turned the key expertly in the lock, and pulled the door back. The horse was there, a beautiful dust-coloured stallion, his owner the only one who could draw the attention to herself while standing beside him. Arwen was looking anxious in her own calm way; Ilesté could read her expressions now. It was a skill that few people who knew her, however long they had known her for, possessed. For Ilesté, it was a matter of holding up the page of history and seeing Arwen's reflection next to her own on the other side.

Their eyes met around the door and they both laughed – Ilesté with surprise, and Arwen with relief. Ilesté looked past her to see Gideon, who was looking over the side of the bridge.

"We thought we'd visit you. I hope that it isn't too bad a time."

Ilesté smiled wryly.

"I'm not busy."

She made sure that there was hay and water in one of the stalls to which this room was devoted, as Gideon scampered inside and ran up the stairs.

"Say hello!" Arwen called after him, and an enthusiastic greeting was yelled back down. The remaining two followed his unseen clamber up, exchanging news: Aran's news, Evie's news, Éowyn and Faramir's news, the varied intricacies of Gondor's politics. All personal history was laid like veneer on the worlds of their discussion. They were both conscious (in the pauses between their words) that many men would have thought it bizarre or unseemly or – if neither of those – of little consequence for a woman and a girl to talk of kingdoms further than their own households. To these men, a house was the expected extent of a woman's knowledge, and therefore her influence. But these two sisters belonged to many houses, had allegiances to many kingdoms. The only one which had underestimated women had fallen for it, twice, and it was a girl who now climbed the top steps of what had been the witch-king's tower.

They reached the top. Gideon had tumbled in some time before them. He was sitting with a mildly superior air on Ilesté's bed.

"I'm so sorry..." she apologized, lifting the lid of the cold chest again, "I don't have much to offer you."

"It doesn't matter, we didn't expect anything," replied Arwen sincerely. She had wandered to the chest-of-drawers, her attention and slender hands running over the tactile stone. Ilesté perceived the exact moment at which she properly noticed the objects around it.

"Gideon, would you like some elderflower juice?" she quickly offered, before Arwen could speak. He nodded enthusiastically.

"Bring a cup from the cupboard and I'll pour you some."

He obligingly slid from the bed and got himself a cup from the cupboard she had indicated. Ilesté could feel Arwen's gaze. When he was seated, satisfied, under the table, Arwen spoke.

"The inscription on the bark which you found in the cloak," she narrowed her eyes, "Can you read it?"

Ilesté didn't answer immediately, and used her pause to move to beside Arwen, gazing at the array of things on the top of the chest-of-drawers. They were beautiful.

"Almost: I can almost read it, like I know the words, but don't know the symbols. It's as if it's a puzzle. Made for me." Her sister smiled.

"It's a code," she murmured. "I can teach you the symbols – they're a very ancient form of Elvish alphabet – but I cannot guess the keyword; it's your puzzle. When you next visit Minas Tirith, I'll explain them. Including the two I brought from Rivendell, there are three books on this script which you can read and learn from. If the past is any example, you'll soon be able to read it flawlessly..." She glanced at Gideon. "We have something to give Ilesté, don't we?" she prompted. He grinned shyly, put his cup down, and went to the bed where he had been sitting to reveal what he had hidden under the blanket. It was a large book, bound in dark blue leather and embossed in silver with a picture of two towers, winged creatures flying between them. Ilesté took the book in her arms and stared at the towers. Arwen had an air of mischief, her grey eyes sparkling as they met Ilesté's brown ones and she answered the unspoken question.

"They're Orthanc, in Isengard, and the tower of Barad-dûr. Flying between are the Nazgûl. Nevertheless, I asked to give you this one. It's one of the five copies of Sam's red book which he allowed us to have made. If he adds anything to the original, the copies will be added to by Elanor."

Ilesté gazed back at the picture, at the Nazgûl's flying beasts. It was almost impossible to be certain that some weren't eagles, flying between the two towers of Minas Anor and Minas Ithil. And a particular small figure on the back of one of them could have been her.

Meanwhile, Arwen had picked up the stone, taken it to the sink, and was bringing it back again. It was filled with water when she placed it back down. Her older sister had made the final connection: it acted as a mirror. They looked into it. She saw them both reflected for a moment, but concentrated on her own image, her shining eyes alight with understanding, and the necklace at her throat shot through with its tiny black tunnels. Ilesté knew what happened next.

The reflection altered. Her face changed subtly and the crystal completely cleared until she saw herself as she had been two years ago, looking into Galadriel's mirror. Her eyes widened despite herself, and together with her earlier self she waited for the reflection to change the second time. This time, Ilesté really studied the alterations that transformed her face into that of the Lady of the Wood. This time neither of them stared at each other in confusion but looked at each other carefully from across time. Galadriel reached out as if to touch Ilesté, but her hand went instead to her necklace and Ilesté touched her own. Galadriel smiled, communicating only unconditional love through her expression, and then her smile faded. She vanished.

Ilesté sighed, making ripples on the water, before she looked up. Arwen was regarding her with a similar contemplative gaze.

"You take after her, Ilesté; your voice especially. Low, and usually quiet. And you often have one of her expressions when you're thinking." She laughed, wonderingly.

Ilesté reached for the white-gold hairs curled on the knotted wood of the chest-of-drawers. Feeling strangely elated, she wound them into the mithril chain, entwining their starlight in its moonlight. Arwen was watching.

"I don't recognise your hands, though. Perhaps they come from your father."

"Perhaps," Ilesté conceded, "but I doubt they're my father's. After all, they've not exactly done the things he wanted. Besides, my father's hands wouldn't be able to peel potatoes..."

Arwen's high laugh filled the tower room, accompanied by Ilesté's lower one, and Gideon's cackle, once he caught on.

"Would you like to stay for supper?" Ilesté added between her laughter.

_A.N. – hope you enjoyed it. Please review, and thank you!_


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